2154 IEEE JOURNAL OF QUANTUM ELECTRONICS, VOL. QE-22, NO.

11, NOVEMBER 1986

The Effect of Pulse Walkoff on Stimulated Raman

Scattering in Fibers
ROGER H. STOLEN AND ANTHONY M . JOHNSON

Abstract-Wehave experimentally investigated stimulated Ramanwalkoff distance. Some general observations are possible.
scattering in single-mode fibers in the regime of large Raman Stokes
For normal dispersion at visible wavelengths, a Stokes
pulse walkoff from the pump pulse by the effect of group-velocity dis-
pulse travels faster than the pump pulse so that SRS will
persion. Measurements are made with 36 ps duration pulses at 532 nm
produced from a frequency-doubled and harmonically mode-locked preferentially eat out the downshifted part of the chirped
Nd:YAG laser. We find that for 20 percent conversion, the Ramanspectrum [SI. At wavelengths of anomalous dispersion in
output is produced about two walkoff lengths into the fiber as a pulse
the infrared, the situation is reversed and the upshifted
of approximately the same duration as the input pulse. We also find
that the Raman pulse is produced with a strong frequency chirp.
part of the broadened spectrum will be attenuated [9].
We would like to understand in more detail the initial
Stokes pulse length and where the Stokes pulse is pro-
I.INTRODUCTION duced in the fiber. We also need to accurately predict a
HE maximum power of an optical pulse in a fiber is Raman threshold or critical power.
T usually limited by stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) To this end, we can perform several different experi-
[l], [2]. These limits have recently become particularly ments which should providesimilarinformation.The
aggravating in attempts to achieve maximum power in fi- simplest experiment is just to look at the fiber and see by
ber-grating compression of optical pulses [3]. This max- thescattered light wherethe Raman Stokes power be-
imum power can be much higher if group-velocity dis- comes strong.Moredetailed temporal information has
persion (GVD) causes walkoff between the incident and been obtained by using a high-speed photodetector and a
generated Raman pulses, so improved understanding of sampling oscilloscope to monitor the twopulses out of the
SRS in the pulse walkoff regime assumes a new impor- fiber. Thepulseseparation identifies thesource of the
tance. Stokes pulse, and the initial Stokes pulse width can be
In fiber-grating compression,theintensity-dependent extracted after correction for subsequent fiber dispersion
refractive index imposes a linear frequency chirp on an and photodetector response. Threshold or critical powers
optical pulse which is subsequently compressed by a dis- are obtained by studying stimulated Raman output power
persive delay line such as a grating pair [4], [ 5 ] . Stimu- for several different fiber lengths, which also provides a
lated Raman scattering robs power from the compressed check on the pulse observations.
pulse and increases the noise. Because the power loss is We find that for Raman conversions in the 10-20 per-
not uniform over the chirped spectrum, SRS also causes cent range, the peak of the Raman Stokes pulse is pro-
broadening and increased tails on the compressed pulse. duced ahead of the input pulse, about two walkoff lengths
Optimal pulse compression requires that the group veloc- from the fiber input, by the action of GVD. In addition,
ity dispersion and fiber length are sufficiently large to in- we find that the initial Stokes pulse width is about the
fluence the chirp of the pulse [4], [ 5 ] .Because the Raman same as the input pulse width. A critical power can be
frequency shift is several times the chirped bandwidth, obtained using the walkoff distance for the interaction
the generated Stokes pulse can separate many pulse widths length, eventhough the Stokes poweris actually produced
from the initial pulse over the length of the fiber as aresult over three to fourwalkoff lengths. One surprising and in-
of GVD. teresting result of the measurements is that the Raman
We already know that most of the Raman Stokes light pulse is generated with a strong frequency chirp.
is produced as a short pulse within the first few walkoff 11. THEORY
lengths [6]. Pulse walkoff complicates an already com- Even though SRS can become complicated in the pulse-
plex process in which energy is transferred from the laser walkoff regime, the important features can be extracted
wavelength to the broad Raman band and is exchanged from a simple picture. We first neglect fiber loss and pump
within the Raman band by Raman gain and four-photon depletion and assume that the Stokespower builds up from
mixing [7]. It is clear, however, that walkoff will limit a weak injected signal rather than from spontaneous scat-
the effective Raman interaction length to the order of the tering. This follows the approach for CW Raman gener-
ation in which the integrated spontaneous Raman scatter-
Manuscript received February 21, 1986; revised June 10, 1986.
The authors are with AT&T Bell Laboratories, Holmdel, NJ 07733. ing along the fiber can be replaced by a weak effective
IEEE Log Number 8610212. Stokes input power [2]. We also consider transfer of en-

0018-9197/86/1100-2154$01.00 @ 1986 IEEE

STOLEN AND JOHNSON: PULSE WALKOFF
RAMANAND SCATTERING
IN
ergy only to a narrow band of wavelengths near the Ra-
man gain maximum and assume negligible spreading of
the pump pulse from GVD.
At the topof Fig. 1, we picture aportion of the injected
CW Raman signal which enters the fiber along with the
leading edge of the pump pulse. Because of GVD, this
part of the signal will travel faster than the pump and never
experience Raman amplification. In thesecond line of Fig.
1, we identify that portion of the signal which enters the
fiber along with the peak of the pump pulse. As the pump
pulse travels along the fiber with velocity V,, the faster
traveling Stokes signal (V,) is amplified by extracting en-
ergy from the pump.Amplification ceases when the signal
has passed through the pump pulse. Maximum amplifi-
cation will occur for a Stokessignal which passes through
the entire pump pulse, and this is the portion of the CW
signal which enters the fiber along with the trailing edge
of the pump pulse (third line of Fig. 1). If a significant
part of the pump energy has been shifted to the Stokes
frequency (pump depletion), subsequent portions of the
CW signalwillseeamuch reduced amplification,as
shown schematically in the figure.
The net result is that amplification of the injected CW
signal by the pump pulse has produced a Stokes pulse with
a peak that is ahead of the pump pulseby about one pump
pulse length (line 7 of Fig. 1). If we define the walkoff
length Zw as the distance inwhich the Stokes signal passes
through one pumpwidth ( T )
we see from Fig. 1 that the Stokes maximum will be pro-
duced about two walkoff lengths into the fiber.
The signal gain depends on distance along the fiber, and
the net amplification involves an integral over the region
where the Stokes and pump pulse interact.
(2b)
where go is the peak Raman gain coefficient, Aefi is the
effective area, and Po is the peak pump power. The pump
pulse width T (FWHM) is 1.665times a l / e Gaussian half
width 7.
In the limit where the Stokes signal sees the entirepump
pulse, the gain becomes
Thus, themaximum gain isapproximately the peak power
times the walkoff length.
Equation (2) also describes the buildup and falloff of
the Stokes output as the pump pulse enters and exits the
fiber. In Fig. 2, the instantaneous Stokes power isplotted
versus time for several fiber lengths. At t' = 0, the peak
FIBERS 2155
.. ..
I
.e..
: F I B E R INPUT
I
I -
I
I ......
-
I
I
I
0 13.0
0 2.0
DISTANCE ALONG F I B E R - walkoff lengths
Fig.1.Schematicrepresentation of a CW Stokessignalamplifiedas it
passes through a pump pulse becauseof GVD. Portions of theCW signal
are separately identified to illustrate that maximum amplification occurs
for that part of the CW signal which enters the fiber with the trailing
edge of the pump pulse. Earlier portions of the CW signal see reduced
gain because they do not pass through the entire pump pulse, and later
portions of the signal see reduced gain because the pump pulse has been
depleted by earlier Raman conversion.
of the pump pulse is just entering the fiber. If the fiber is
much longer than the walkoff distance, the Stokes power
is constant afteran initial rise. Actually, thiswill not hap-
pen because of fiber loss and pump depletion. LaterStokes
signal will see reduced pump powerand the Stokes output
power will be much reduced.This can happenquite
quickly because the value of G in (3) will be around 19
for significant Stokes conversion (see the Appendix). A
10 percent decrease in Po reduces the Stokes power to
about 15 percent of maximum. The actual pulse shape in
a long fiber might be expected to be more like the dashed
line in Fig. 2. A simple picture of the formation of an
amplified Stokes pulse from an injected CW signal would
include a leading edge thatis shaped by nonlinear gain as
it passes through the pump pulse and a trailing edge that
is shaped by the depletion of that pump pulse.
The dashed line in Fig. 2 should be a reasonable first
approximation for Raman conversions on the order of 10
percent. In Fig. 2, the Raman pulse width is slightly larger
than the pump pulse width, and from Fig. 1, the peak of
the Stokes pulse is produced about two walkoff distances
into the fiber. At lower pump powers where there much is
less Raman conversion, the depletion will be slower and
the Raman pulse will be produced over a longer part of
the fiber. Raman conversions significantly greater than 10
percent will quickly deplete the pump so the Stokes max-
imum will be produced much earlier in the fiber. Detailed
understanding will requiremorecompletecalculations
2156 IEEE JOURNAL OF QUANTUM ELECTRONICS, VOL. QE-22, NO. 11, NOVEMBER 1986
t/T
Fig. 2. Instantaneous Raman Stokes power versus time for different fiber
lengths as calculated from (2). The fiber lengths are 1.2, 1.8, 2.4, and
3.6 walkoff lengths and the solid curves do not include pump depletion.
The dashed lineis an estimate of what would happen to the Stokes pulse
in a long fiber with pump depletion.
which take into account amplification of spontaneous Ra-
man scattering, pump depletion, and the actual shape of
the Raman gain curve. In the present work, we attempt to
build up this understanding by a series of experimental
measurements.
After the Stokes pulse is generated, dispersion in the
remaining fiber will cause pulse spreading and separation
of the Stokes andpump pulses. The relative timedelay of
the Stokes and pump pulses At after a fiber length A L is
given by
AL Av
At = -D ( X ) - (4)
c V
where Av is the frequency separation between pump and
Stokes frequencies, v is the average frequency, and D( X)
is the dispersion in dimensionless units [IO]. For a pump
wavelength of 532nm, v/c = 18577 cm-', D( X) =
0.073, Av/c = 440 cm-', andthe Stokes pulsetravels
faster than the pump. The walkoff distance for a 36 ps
pulse is 6.25 m. Use of (4) to estimate the source of the
Raman Stokes pulse in the fiber from measurements of
output pulse separation will, however,place the source of
the Stokes pulse tooearly in the fiber because the peak of
the amplified Stokes pulse is actually generated about one
pump pulse width ahead of the pump pulse. A reasonable
estimate of the source of the Raman pulse can be obtained
by subtracting one walkoff length from the distance cal-
culated using the measured relative time delay in (4).
A measurement of average Raman power versus fiber
length measures the areas of the curves in Fig. 2. From
Figs. 1 and 2, we would expect almost no Raman power
out of a fiber only one walkoff period long, while the Ra-
man power would be independent of length for a fiber
longer than 3-4 walkoff lengths if the Raman conversion
is greater than IO percent.
111. EXPERIMENTAL
A. Experimental Details
Thebasic experimental setup is illustrated in Fig. 3.
Optical pulses at a wavelength of 532 nm are coupled into
a single-mode polarization-preserving fiber. Raman and
FAST OR SLOW
DETECTORS
nm
/14U+ATo
1064 532 nm
DOUBLER
LENGTH
PULSE
MONITOR Q-0
FIBER
PUMP RAMAN
Fig. 3 . Experimentalsetup for themeasurement of Raman power as a
function of input power and fiber length.
pump pulses are measured with a fast photodetector and
a sampling oscilloscope.Integrated stimulated Raman
Stokes power is measured at the fiber output after sepa-
ration of Stokes and pump wavelengths by a grating, and
total pump power was measured ahead of thegrating.
These measurements were repeated for several different
fiber lengths. We could also vary the input pulse width
and scan the Raman spectrum.
Most measurements were made with 36 ps transform-
limited pulses produced by a frequency-doubled and har-
monically mode-locked Nd : YAG laser [ 111. A particular
advantage of this sytem is the isolation provided by the
doubler. The power coupled into the fiber can be varied
by simply adjustingthe input lens without having re-
flected light modify the characteristicsof the mode-locked
pulse. The laser was stable over long periods of time, al-
though periodicchecks were made of the pulse width
which was always within 2 percent of 36 ps. The pulse-
to-pulse variation in peak power was less that 3 percent.
The polarization-preserving fiber was produced by pre-
form deformation [12] and had a silica core, a borosilicate
stress cladding, and a flourosilicate outer cladding. The
core diameter was 4.1 pm and the core-cladding index
difference was 0.0054.Thecoresize was checked by
measuring the far-field profile out of the fiber and com-
paring it to calculations using a step-index profile [13].
The loss at 532 nm was 14 dB/km.
B. Pulse Measurements
Temporal measurementsof the Raman and pump pulses
were made with a high-speed polycrystalline CdTe pho-
todetector and asampling oscilloscope [ 141. The temporal
measurements of the output pulses from a 34 m fiber are
displayed in Fig. 4(a) and (b), respectively, for about 25
percent Raman conversion and for no Raman conversion,
as obtained by rotating the input polarization 45" [ 151.
Fig. 4(c) is the sampling oscilloscope trace of the photo-
detector response to 1 ps duration pulses at 590 nm from
a mode-locked dye laser synchronously pumped by the 36
ps duration 532 nm pulses [16]. From the half width of
this scope trace, we estimate the total systemresponse to
be 38ps. As an independent check of thesystem re-
sponse, Fig. 4(d)is the system responseto the 36 ps pump
pulses with a resultant half width of 52 ps. Using a Gauss-
ian deconvolution of the system response, which entails
taking the square root of the difference of the squares of
the half widths of the scope trace and the 38 ps system
response, we estimate the pump pulse duration to be 37.5
 FIBERS
STOLENANDJOHNSON:PULSEWALKOFFANDRAMANSCATTERING IN 2 157

expectedly large and was the major source of uncertainty

in the measurements.
In Fig. 6 , we plot the fractional conversion of pump to
Stokes power as a functionof peak input power. The frac-
tional conversion is the ratio of Stokes power to total out-
put power. The input peak power is calculated knowing
the pulse width (36 ps), repetition rate (100.498 MHz),
the fiber loss, the fiber output end reflection, and the loss
in the output lens.
For fibers 21 m and longer, there is no measurable dif-
ference in conversion from pump to Raman power, except
at low powers where the conversion is small. For shorter
fiber lengths, the Raman power drops dramatically until
at 6.7 m (not shown in Fig. 6), there is almost no Raman
output. For comparison, the calculated walkoff distance
is 6.25 m.
Fig. 4. (a) Raman and pump outputs from a 34 m polarization-preserving Measurements were made leaving the input end in place
fiber measured with a fast photodetector and a sampling oscilloscope. and cutting lengths of fiber from the output end. The one
(b) Same as (a) except that the input polarization is set45" to the fiber's exception was the 101 m length, and here there were dis-
principal axes which suppresses SRS at these powers. (c) Photodetector
response measured with a 1 ps dye laser pulse at 590 nm (38 ps FWHM). crepancies as illustrated by the dashed line in the figure.
(d) Photodetector response to 36 ps pump pulses (52 ps FWHM). If the dashed line is shifted to line upwith the other mea-
surements for 20 percent conversion, the Raman conver-
ps. The pump pulses were independently determined to sion is higher than in the shorter fibers for conversion less
be 36 ps by the standard technique of background-free than 10 percent. The 101 m measurements weremade first
nonlinear optical autocorrelation. and the output end of the 101 m fiber became the input
The results of similar measurements at different powers end of the 38 m fiber. The discrepancy could arise from
for several different fiber lengths are plotted in Fig. 5. In a variation in diameter along the fiber of about 2 percent
Fig. 5(a), we plot the apparent distance from the fiber which would be hard to observe. We examined photo-
input end to the source of the Raman pulse as deduced graphs of eachend of the fiber and did not see such
from (4). The procedure is to calculate a length from the changes, but these observations are only accurate to about
pulse separation and (4). This length is then subtracted 2 percent. It is also possible that there was some drift in
from the fiber length to give the apparent source of the the calibration of the power meter between the first mea-
Raman pulse. The percent Stokes conversion isestimated surements on the long fiber and the latter measurements
from photos such as Fig. 4(a) as the ratio of areas of the for which measurements were checked against primary
Stokes pulse over the sum of the areas of the pump and standards.
Stokes pulses.
The pulse half widths were measured off the photo- D. Other Measurements
graphs. The deconvolved Stokes half widths are plotted
Measurements were made of Stokes output power with
in Fig. 5(b) as a function of fiber length. Above 20 per-
the 101 m fiber for 68 ps pulses as well as 36 ps pulses.
cent Raman conversion, therewas no observable variation
There was no measurable difference for the output power
of pulse width with power. Below 15 percent conversion,
the pulse appearedto belonger, although theuncertaintiesas a function of average pump power. This shows that the
also became larger. decrease in peak power is exactly compensatedby the in-
creased interaction length.
We could also estimate the sourceof the Raman Stokes
pulse by simply looking at the sideof the fiber. It happensThe spectrum of the Stokes light andthebroadened
pump line was measured for the 101 m fiber both for 36
that some laser safety glasses block 532 nm, but pass some
and 68 ps pulses of the same average power. These spec-
of the Stokes-shifted light. The fiber appears green from
Rayleigh scattering of the Stokes light after tra are presented in Fig. 7. As expected, the pump spec-
significant
Raman conversion and orange from fluorescence before. trum is about twiceas broad for the 36 ps pulse.The
This change took place about 5.5 m into the fiber for 40asymmetries in the pump spectrum can be traced to the
percent Raman conversion and 10 m for Raman conversionwhich,forthesemeasurements,
20 percent. These is
about 20 percent [8]. Wavebreaking sidebands are seen
points are also shown in Fig. 5(a).
on the 36 ps pump spectrum, but not on the 68 ps spec-
trum, which is expected because the fiber length for these
C. SRS Power for Diferent Fiber Lengths
features to deve1o.p increases as the square of the input
Average power measurements were made using silicon pulse length [ 171. There is little evidence for transfer of
photodiode detectors which were calibrated with thermal energy within the pulse which would result in growth of
detectors. The scatter in power measurements proved un- the sharp featureat 490 cm-' [7]. Spectra were monitored
2158 IEEE JOURNAL OF QUANTUM ELECTRONICS.VOL. QE-22, KO. 1 1 , NOVEMBER 1986

14 200
0 20.3 m
0 25.2 m
12 34 m
101 m 160
OBSERVED IN

I I I 1 1 I 1 , I I I I I I
0 10 20 30 40 50 0 20 40 60 80 100
RAMAN CONVERSION
-METERS
LENGTH
-PERCENT
FIBER

(a) (b)
Fig. 5. (a) Apparent distance from the fiber input as calculated from the
relative delay of the pump and Raman pulses and the known dispersion.
(b) Measured Raman pulse length (FWHM) as a function of fiber length
after deconvolution of photodetector response.

n
0

-T

. .

f
z o
H
:I,
N
0

0
2.:
i r
I;.\ : ,[ EXPANDED VERTICALLY 5X

, ~

0 100 200 300 400 500

FREQUENCY SHIFT (cm-')

Fig. 7. Raman and pump spectra as measured from a 101 m fiber at about
20 percent Raman conversion: -68 ps pulse, . . . . . 36 ps pulse. 9

fiber. This can be seen by use of the data of Fig. 5(a)

along with thequalitative picture of Fig. 1. Thepulse
/ separation measurements of Fig. 5(a) show that for 20
I I I I I J percent Raman conversion, the Stokes pulse appears using
140 160 180 200 (4)to be generated close to one walkoff length from the
PEAK PUMP POWER -WATTS fiber input. As discussed in Section 11, this means that the
Fig. 6. Thepercentage Ramanconversion as a function of peakpump Stokes pulse is actually generated about two walkoff
power at thefiber input. The different fibers lengths shown by solid lines lengths into thefiber because the Stokes pulse is generated
share the same input end. The 101 m fiber (dashed line) does not share
the same input end, and we believe that the Raman conversion is reduced ahead of the pump pulse. This picture is supported by ob-
because the core diameter is slightly larger in the first few meters of servations of theside-scatteredlight which show the
fiber. Stokes light appearing further from the fiber input than
implied by the data of Fig. 5(a). Thepoint of Stokes peak
during the experiments by imaging the dispersed pump power was hard to identify in the scattered light so the
and Raman output on a wall. No differences were seen in actual maximum will probably be somewhat further from
the spectra for different fiber lengths. the input than the points in Fig. 5(a) which show where
Stokes light first appeared. From Fig. 5(a), it is clear that
IV. DISCUSSION the source of the Raman pulse varies with input power as
The experimental results support a picture of Raman expected, but that the simple picture of a Stokes pulse
Stokes generation in which a Stokes pulse is produced with produced one walkoff length ahead of the pump may break
its maximum appearing abouttwo walkoff lengths into the down for small Raman conversion.
STOLEN
JOHNSON:
AND PULSE WALKOFF
RAMANAND SCATTERING IN FIBERS 2159

The pulse width data can be used to estimate an initial 21-38 m fibers, the dividing point between low and high
Stokes pulse width, but in making the estimate, there were Raman conversion is about 3-5 percent. The Stokes power
two surprises. The first was thatthespreading of the is reduced by a factor of two in the 16m fiber and is much
Stokes pulse was greater than expected from the disper- less in the 11 m fiber. This agrees with the general picture
sion and Raman spectrum, and the second was that the in which the peak of the Stokes pulse is generated ap-
Raman pulse is generated with a strong frequency chirp. proximately two walkoff lengths into the fiber, and all of
The additional pulse spreading in 67 m of fiber as ob- the pulse has been produced by 3-4 walkoff periods ex-
tained from the pulse widths out of the 34 and 101 m fi- cept when the Raman conversion is small.
bers is 113 k 7 ps. The predicted spreading is only 78 ps From the point of view of pulse compression, the most
as based on a spectral half width 6v = 90 cm-' at an important aspect of SRS is the prediction of threshold
average Stokes frequency of 1.84 X lo4 cm-' from Fig. power. To establish a method of predicting this threshold,
7 and a dispersion of 0.071 [lo]. It is possible that there we compare our experimental measurements of Raman
may be an error in the 101 m point, but this was impos- conversion to theoretical predictions which relate a criti-
sible to check because the fiber was cut up for the other cal power PCto a parameter y 121.
measurements.
PcgoLeff
It does appear, however, that the Raman pulse starts out y=- (5)
with a chirp. This is seen by assuming an initial linear Aeff

chirp so that the pulse width outof the fiber is the sum of where go is the peak Raman gain (1.86 cm/W) [ 131, AeK
the initial width and the subsequent spreading. If this is is the effective area, and Leffis the interaction length.The
done, both the 34 and 101 m measurements agree that a parameter y is essentially G of (3) and usually has a value
pulse produced 12 m from the fiber input was 32 ps long. around 16, but for the present short interaction length im-
On the other hand, the assumptionof no initial chirp and posed by the walkoff distance, y will be somewhat larger.
a Gaussian convolution leads to an initial pulse width of As discussed in the Appendix, for thepresent experimen-
58 ps for the 34 m fiber and 102 ps for the 101 m fiber. tal parameters, y = 19.7. The walkoff distance of 6.25 m
Not only should the initial pulse width be the sameboth in and effective area of 1.22 X cm2 in ( 5 ) then gives a
fibers, but it has to be less than themeasured 50 ps out of critical peak power of 195 W for a 36 ps pulse. The re-
the 20 m fiber. lation of ( 5 ) is derived for a CW pump which is quite
We performed a simple preliminary experiment to ver- different from the present situation, but at 195 W, we see
ify the existence of the chirp. The Raman spectrum at 35 about 20 percent conversion. The critical power for CW
percent conversion from a 21 m fiber was dispersed by a Raman generation is defined to be the power where the
grating and imagedontothe high-speed photodetector Stokes power equals the pump power, which would cor-
while thesamplingoscilloscope was triggered by the respond to 50 percentconversion[2],[19].Theagree-
100.498 MHz RF signal used to drive the acoustooptic ment between our results and predictions based on the CW
modulator of the Nd: YAG laser. As the spectrum was model is remarkably good. In pulse compression experi-
tuned across a slit on the photodetector, there was a clear ments, a threshold condition that gives 20 percent con-
variation in delay time. The difference in delay was 80 ps version still is a useful upper limit to the power, although
over the extremes of the spectrum of Fig. 7. The chirp usually it is desirable to keep the Raman conversion be-
was of the correct sign to add to the subsequent pulse low 5 percent [3].
spreading, but the chirp did not seem to be linear.
Some chirp of the Raman pulse is to be expected be- V. CONCLUSION
cause it is generated from a pump pulse which is already The SRS measurements in the regime of large pulse
chirped, although it is surprising tofind such a large chirp walkoff have shown that the Raman Stokes pulse is pro-
[ 181. The chirp of the generated first Stokes pulse is ex- duced within the first 3-4 walkoff periods in the fiber. The
pected to be comparable to that of the pump, but we find peak is generated about two walkoff periods into the fiber
a Raman chirp at least three times the pump chirp at the for conversion near 20 percent and moves closer to the
source of the Raman pulse. Any additional chirp from self- input for higher pump powers due to pump depletion and
phase modulation of theRaman pulse should be negligible further from theinput for lower powers.The initial Stokes
because the chirp is measured from a fiber so short that pulse width is about the same as that of the initial pump
the pulse does not propagate very far after it is generated. pulse and could be shorter for very high pump powers and
Information on the initial width and position of the Ra- much longer for very low powers.
man pulse can also be extracted from the Stokes power The SRS threshold power depends on length and effec-
versus pump power curves of Fig. 6. Here we see that tive area in the same way as for CW interactions, except
there is little increase in the Raman output power once thethat the interaction length becomes the walkoff distance.
fiber is longer than 21 m or 3.4 walkoff lengths. If, how- This shows that large GVD can be highly desirable for
ever, we include the dataon the 101 m fiber, there is evi- the suppression of SRS.
dence that for small Raman conversions, Stokes power Finally,wehavemadethe first measurement of a
continues to be produced at lengths greater than 21 m. chirped Raman Stokes pulse in a single mode fiber, an
After shifting the 101 m data to line upwith that from the observation that we intend to investigate further.
2160 JOURNAL
IEEE NO. OF
QE-22,
ELECTRONICS,
QUANTUM
VOL. 11, NOVEMBER 1986

APPENDIX [5] W. J. Tomlinson, R. H. Stolen, and C. V. Shank, Compression of

optical pulses chirped by self-phase modulation in fibers, J . Opt.
To estimate a critical threshold
or power, we simply use SOC.Amer. B , vol. 1, pp. 139-149, 1984.
the CW theory [2] in which the power is the peak pulse [6] B. Valk, W. Hodel, and H. P. Weber, Stimulated Raman spectra
generated by ps-pulses in a single-mode fiber, Opt. Commun., vol.
power and the length is replaced by 1.061, as shown by 54, pp. 363-368, 1985.
(3).The criterion used by Smith toestimateacritical [7] R. H. Stolen, C. Lee, and R. K. Jain, Development of the stimu-
power was to choose that power for which an effective latedRamanspectruminsingle-modesilicafibers, J . Opt.SOC.
Amer. B , vol. 1, pp. 652-657, 1984.
input power from spontaneous Raman scattering P,(eff) [8] A. M. Weiner, J. P. Heritage, and R. H. Stolen, unpublished.
is amplified up to the pump power whileneglecting pump [9] E. M. Dianov, A. Ya. Karasik, P. V. Mamyshev, A. M. Prokhorov,
depletion. V. N. Serkin, M. F. Stelmakh, and A. A. Fomichev, Stimulated-
Ramanconversion of multisolitonpulsesinquartzopticalfibers,
P,(eff) ey = PC (AI) Sov. Phys. JETP Lett., vol. 41, pp. 294-297, 1985.
[lo] D. Gloge, Dispersion in weakly guiding fibers, Appl. Opt., vol.
P,(eff) = hv,& BvFWHMY-~~ (A2) 10, pp. 2442-2445, 1971.
[ l l ] A. M. Johnson and W. M. Simpson, Tunable femtosceond dye laser
where y is defined in ( 5 ) . This criterion has been shown synchronouslypumped by thecompressed secondharmonicof
Nd:YAG, J . Opt. SOC. Amer. B , vol. 2, pp. 619-625, 1985.
to also be valid for Lorentzian line shapes when pump R.H.Stolen,W.Pleibel, and J . R.Simpson,High-birefringence
depletion is included [19]. optical fibers by preform deformation, J . Lightwave Technol., vol.
Using the values for the present fiber, LT-2, pp. 639-641, 1984.
R. H. Stolen and E. P. Ippen, Raman gain in glass optical wave-
v, = vSc = 5.51 X 1014 s - l guides, Appl. Opt., vol. 22, pp. 276-278, 1973.
A . M . Johnson, D. W. Kisker, W. M. Simpson, and R. D. Feldman,
PicosecondphotoconductivityinpolycrystallineCdTefilmspre-
go = 1.86 X lo- cm/W pared by uv enhanced OMCVD, in Picosecond Electronics and Op-
toelectronics, G . Mourou, D. Bloom, and C. Lee, Eds. New York:
= 1.86 X lo- (incgsunits) Springer-Verlag, 1985, pp. 188-192.
R. H . Stolen, Polarization effects in fiber Raman and Brillouin la-
Aeff = 12.2 X IO- cm2 sers, IEEEJ. QuantumElectron., vol. QE-15, pp. 1157-1160, 1979.
A. M. Johnson and W. M. Simpson, Continuous-wave modelocked
Leff= 1.061, = 663 cm Nd :YAG pumped subpicosecond dye lasers, Opt. Lett., vol. 8, pp.
554-556, 1983.
BvFWHM = c * 250 cm- = 7.5 X 10l2s-. (A3) W . J . Tomlinson, R. H. Stolen, and A . M. Johnson, Optical wave
breaking of pulses in nonlinear optical fibers, Opt. Lett., vol. 10,
The most uncertain parameter is 6v, which is here taken pp.457-459, 1985.
V. N. Lugovi, Stimulated Raman emission and frequency scanning
as the half width of the Raman gain spectrum [ 7 ] . Using in an optical waveguide, Sov. Phys. JETP, vol. 44, pp. 683-689,
these parameters, the criterion for a critical power is met 1976.
with a value for y of 19.7. J. Auyeung and A. Yariv, Spontaneous and stimulated Raman scat-
tering in long low loss fibers, IEEE J . Quantum Electron., vol. QE-
1 4 , ~ 347-352,
~ . 1978.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
We would like to thank E. P. Ippen for helpful discus-
sions concerning Raman amplification by a short pump
pulse and W. M. Simpson for experttechnical assistance.
REFERENCES
R. H. Stolen, Nonlinear properties of optical fiber, in Optical Fi-
ber Telecommunications, S. E. Miller and A. G. Chynoweth, Eds.
New York: Academic, 1979, ch. 5, pp. 125-150.
R. G. Smith, Optical power handling capacity of low loss optical
fibers as determined by stimulated Raman and Brillouin scattering,
Appl. Opt., V O ~ .11, pp. 2489-2494, 1972.
A. M. Johnson,R. H. Stolen,andW. M. Simpson, SOX single-
stage compressionof frequency doubledNd : yttrium aluminum garnet
laser pulses, Appl. Phys. Lett., vol. 44, pp. 729-731, 1984.
D. Grichkowsky and A. C. Balant, Optical pulse compressionbased
on enhanced frequency chirping, Appl. Phys. Lett., vol. 41, pp. 1- Anthony M. Johnson, for a photograph and biography, see p. 141 of the
3, 1982. January 1986 issue of this JOURNAL.