MBI Staff Member – Personal info
Dr. Martin Moerbeck-Bock
martin.bock(at)mbi-berlin.de
+49 30 6392 1442
C2: Solid State Light Sources
Building C, 2.5
Position
Project Member: 1.2 "Ultrafast Laser Physics and Nonlinear Optics"
Research
Mid-infrared laser becoming increasingly important for high-harmonic generation (attosecond pulse), development of novel x-ray sources, and strong-field physics. Optical parametric chirped-pulse amplification (OPCPA) seems to be the most promosing approach to generate high power midinfrared pulses, i.e. few-cyle pulses with pulse energies in the mJ range at kHz repetition rates. However, powerful pump lasers are required.
To exploite the relatively high nonlinear coefficient of non-oxide crystals, such as ZnGeP2, the emitted wavelength of the pump sources have to be above 2 µm. This ensures that the absorption in the nonlinear crystals is significantly reduced. Here we concentrate our research on regenerative amplifiers using Ho:YLF as a gain medium with a central wavelenght of around 2050 nm. Pulse energies in the millijoule regime (~10 mJ) have been achieved directly from our regenerative amplifier which was conceptually designed as a ring cavity. With the entire setup shown in Fig. 1 we are able to generate pulse energies of up to 55 mJ at 1 kHz with very low pulse-to-pulse fluctuations (rms < 0.5 %).
Fig. 1. High power 2 µm laser delivering pulse energies of up to 55 mJ. The seed-source is a three-stage system consiting of a fs Er:fiber laser, a super-continuum highly nonlinear fiber and a Tm:fiber pre amplifier. After 24 round trips a state of operation is reached where the regenerative amplifier emits stable pulses (rms < 0.3 %) of around 10 mJ at 1 kHz. A booster (two Ho:YLF crystals) stage raises the pulse energy to > 50 mJ.
Curriculum vitae
2013-present Postdoc at the Max Born Institute: High-power mid-infrared lasers
2013 Dissertation “Programmable ultrashort pulsed highly localized wave packets” at the Max Born Institute
2008-2013 Ph. D. student at the Max Born Institute
2008 Master thesis “Spatio-spectral shaping of few-cycle laser pulses with liquid crystal displays” at the Max Born Institute
2006-2008 Study of -Photonics- at the University of Applied Science Wildau (Graduation: Master of Engineering)
2005 Diploma thesis “Spatio-spectrally resolved characterization of ultrashort laser pulses” at the Max Born Institute (MBI) for Nonlinear Optics and Short Pulse Spectroscopy
2001-2005 Study of -Physical Engineering- of the department Engineering / Industrial Engineering with Business Studies at the University of Applied Science Wildau (Graduation: Diploma-Engineer)
MBI Publications
- 2.05 μm CPA delivering 75 mJ pulses with 2.2 ps duration at a 1 kHz repetition rate Optics Express 33 (2025) 17245-17252
- Self-compression of 5-µm pulses in hollow waveguides Optics Communications 579 (2025) 131584/1-6
- Nonlinear compression of few-cycle multi-mJ 5 µm pulses in ZnSe around zero-dispersion Optics Letters 49 (2024) 351-354
- Ho:YLF regenerative amplifier delivering 22 mJ, 2.0 ps pulses at a 1 kHz repetition rate Optics Express 32 (2024) 23499-23509
- Generation of propagation-dependent OAM self-torque with chirped spiral gratings Photonics 11 (2024) 11050463/1-15
- Characterization of orbital angular momentum beams by polar mapping and Fourier Transform Photonics 11 (2024) 1-15
- Orbital angular momentum encoded beam tracking and wavefront sensing Journal of Lightwave Technology 41 (2023) 2017-2024
- Structuring light by combining spatial modulation and fast angular shaping SPIE Proceedings Series 1243606 (2023) 1243606/1-6
- Pulse shaping in a midwave-IR OPCPA for multi-μJ few-cycle pulse generation at 12 μm via DFG Optics Express 31 (2023) 14096-14108
- Ultrafast element- and depth-resolved magnetization dynamics probed by transverse magneto-optical Kerr effect spectroscopy in the soft x-ray range Physical Review Research 4 (2022) L022062/1-7