Polyhedron ZIF-67 nanoparticles deposited on a D-shape fibre for stable soliton operation in an ultrashort fibre laser

Abstract

In this study, we report the nonlinear optical properties of the polyhedron zeolitic imidazolate framework-67 (ZIF-67) deposited on a D-shape fibre. The ZIF-67 deposited D-shape fibre possessed a low saturation intensity of 20.7 MW cm⁻², and a modulation depth of 0.26%. By incorporating the newly developed ZIF-67/D-shape fibre as the saturable absorber into the Er-doped fibre laser, stable soliton pulses can be produced with a central wavelength of 1557.18 nm, a full width at half-maximum (FWHM) spectral width of 2.3 nm, a pulse width of 1.12 ps, and a signal-to-noise ratio of 48.4 dB. The experimental results open a new path to realize ultrafast lasers with metal–organic frameworks as saturable absorbers, which could benefit the development of ultrafast optoelectronics, materials chemistry and physics.