Author:
Feng Chengyong,Holcomb Robert,Jenkins Gregory W.,Dorrer Christophe,Bromage Jake
Abstract
We introduce cascaded quadratic nonlinearity inside a regenerative amplifier to allow cavity-net nonlinearity tunable in both magnitude and sign. By exploiting the regime with enhanced net positive nonlinearity, we demonstrate direct amplification of 10-µJ, 1.2-ps seed pulses to 0.5 mJ, 200 fs from a Yb:YAG thin-disk regenerative amplifier.