A mid-infrared broadband laser including: a femtosecond laser configured to generate a near-infrared light; nonlinear waveguide configured to broaden and/or shift a spectrum of the light from the femtosecond laser; and a nonlinear medium configured to generate a broadband light by mixing spectral components of the output from the non-linear waveguide. Optionally, at least one dispersion compensation element may be placed between the femtosecond laser and the nonlinear waveguide and/or between the nonlinear waveguide and the nonlinear medium.

A measurement apparatus, including: a tapered optical fiber, the tapered optical fiber having an input to receive radiation and having an output to provide spectrally broadened output radiation toward a measurement target, the tapered optical fiber configured to spectrally broaden the radiation received at the input; and a detector system configured to receive a redirected portion of the output radiation from the measurement target.

A method of making a microstructured optical fiber including loading the core and cladding materials of the fiber with hydrogen and deuterium at a loading temperature; annealing the fiber at a selected temperature T.sub.anneal; pumping the fiber with radiation; and reducing the temperature of the fiber and storing the fiber at the reduced temperature before the step of pumping the fiber; and wherein the method allows the hydrogen and the deuterium to become bound to the core material and the cladding material.

[Object] There is provided a wideband extended pulsed light source that maintains uniqueness of an elapsed time with respect to a wavelength and does not collapse the uniqueness of an elapsed time with respect to a wavelength even when an output is increased. [Solution] Light L1 from a pulsed laser source 11 is converted into supercontinuum light by a nonlinear element 12, is output as wideband pulsed light L2, and is caused to enter a pulse extension element 2. The pulse extension element 2 that is a multi-core fiber performs pulse extension in each of cores 211 and outputs wideband extended pulsed light L3. In the wideband extended pulsed light L3, an elapsed time and a wavelength in a pulse correspond to each other on one-to-one basis, and the wideband extended pulsed light L3 is used as light for spectrometry.

A broadband radiation source device, including a fiber assembly having a plurality of optical fibers, each optical fiber being filled with a gas medium, wherein the broadband radiation source device is operable such that subsets of the optical fibers are independently selectable for receiving a beam of input radiation so as to generate a broadband output from only a subset of the plurality of optical fibers at any one time.

A radiation source includes: a hollow core optical fiber, a working medium; and a pulsed pump radiation source. The hollow core optical fiber has a body and has a hollow core. The working medium is disposed within the hollow core. The pulsed pump radiation source is arranged to produce pulsed pump radiation that is received by, and propagates through, the hollow core from an input end to an output end. One or more parameters of the pulsed pump radiation, the optical fiber and the working medium are configured to allow soliton self-compression of the pulsed pump radiation so as to change a spectrum of the pulsed pump radiation so as to form output radiation. In some embodiments, a length of the optical fiber is such that the output end substantially coincides with a position at which a temporal extent of the pulsed pump radiation is minimal.

A coherent anti-stokes Raman scattering apparatus for imaging a sample includes an optical output; an optical source arranged to generate a first optical signal at a first wavelength; and a nonlinear element arranged to receive the first optical signal, where the nonlinear element is arranged to cause the first optical signal to undergo four-wave mixing on transmission through the nonlinear element such that a second optical signal at a second wavelength and a third optical signal at a third wavelength are generated, wherein an optical signal pair including two of the first, second and third optical signals is provided to the optical output for imaging the sample.

A supercontinuum light source can include a seed laser arranged to provide seed pulses with a pulse frequency F.sub.seed; a pulse frequency multiplier (PFM) arranged to multiply the seed pulses by converting pulses having the pulse frequency F.sub.seed to pump pulses with a pulse frequency F.sub.pump, where F.sub.pump is larger than F.sub.seed; and a non-linear element arranged to receive said pump pulses and convert said pump pulses to pulses of supercontinuum light. The PFM can further include a splitter for splitting pulses into first and second sub beams each having the same pulse frequency, where the PFM is configured such that the sub beams experience different delays; and a combiner for combining said first and second sub beams into a beam having the pulse frequency that is greater than said same pulse frequency. The splitter can have an uneven splitter ratio.

A system for generating light, comprises a spectral light source, characterized by a spectral line shape described by a visibility function; and a multimode waveguide, characterized by an optical path difference distribution described by a standard deviation. The standard deviation typically matches, within a predetermined tolerance, a location of a zero point of the visibility function at which a contrast of the visibility function is less than 0.1.

A Photonic Crystal Fiber (PCF) a method of its production and a supercontinuum light source comprising such PCF. The PCF has a longitudinal axis and includes a core extending along the length of said longitudinal axis and a cladding region surrounding the core. At least the cladding region includes a plurality of microstructures in the form of inclusions extending along the longitudinal axis of the PCF in at least a microstructured length section. In at least a degradation resistant length section of the microstructured length section the PCF includes hydrogen and/or deuterium. In at least the degradation resistant length section the PCF further includes a main coating surrounding the cladding region, which main coating is hermetic for the hydrogen and/or deuterium at a temperature below T.sub.h, wherein T.sub.h is at least about 50° C., preferably 50° C.<T.sub.h<250° C.