Amplification and Compression of Weak Picosecond Optical Pulses by Using Semiconductor Laser Amplifiers.

A novel pulse-compression scheme is proposed and demonstrated for compressing weak picosecond pulses having energies as small as 0.1 pJ. A semiconductor laser amplifier is shown to impose a nearly linear frequency chirp on the pulse as it amplifies the pulse. The amplified chirped pulse can be compressed by passing it through a dispersive delay line. The theory shows that depending on the operating conditions the pulse width can be reduced by a factor ~2-4 and the peak power can be enhanced by a factor ~10-100. The preliminary experimental results are in agreement with theory.