Nonlinear Optical Properties of Ag Nanoplates Plasmon Resonance and Applications in Ultrafast Photonics

Metal nanomaterials have attracted increasing attention due to their outstanding nonlinear optical and photonic properties, making them as potential saturable absorber (SA) candidates for realizing ultrafast photonic devices. In this article, we demonstrate the generation of mode-locked dual-wavelength pulse trains in an Ag nanoplates (AgNPTs)-based Yb-doped all-fiber laser for the first time to the best of our knowledge. The AgNPTs are synthesized by seed-mediated growth and then integrated into a fiber ferrule by optical deposition, which serve as SA in the ring laser cavity. The plasmonic properties of such nanoplates are measured by absorption spectrophotometry and their nonlinear optical properties are characterized by Z-scan. The measured nonlinear saturable absorption of the AgNPTs-based SA is 6.4%. In our laser, the dual-wavelength synchronous mode-locking is achieved at the center wavelengths of 1031.92 and 1033.24 nm with 3-dB spectral bandwidth of 0.52 and 0.46 nm, respectively, where 293-ps pulse trains with a repetition rate of 11.43 MHz are obtained at the pump power of 350 mW. The results demonstrate that the solution-processed AgNPTs are promising SA candidates for achieving stable and low-cost pulsed laser sources which could be used for spectroscopy and ultrafast photonics.