Spectral hole burning for ultra-stable lasers

Spectral hole burning in rare-earth ion doped crystals is a versatile system in time-frequency metrology and related applications. The narrow optical transitions of the dopant ions can serve as a frequency reference for laser stabilization. The expected fractional frequency stability can potentially be orders of magnitude better than room temperature Fabry-Perot-cavity-locked lasers at the state of the art. The aim of this thesis project is to improve, and explore the fundamental limits of such techniques. The spectral holes sensitivity towards the uni-axial stress and external E-field has been characterized, so that the effect on the laser frequency fluctuation could be deduced and minimized. A special environment has also been explored, where the effect of temperature fluctuations on the frequency of spectral holes can be compensated at first order by pressure-induced shift in the opposite direction. Moreover, much work has been devoted to the development of ultra-low-noise detection techniques, which allows getting lower detection noise by employing different spectral structures.

ultra-stable laser, rare-earth ions, frequency metrology

Full document (EN) : TEL-03870065