Etude de sources supercontinuum à fibres optiques en verre de tellurite pour la spectroscopie d'absorption moyen infrarouge appliquées à la détection de gaz

摘要

This work focuses on the development of mid-infrared supercontinuum light sources and their application for gas detection through absorption spectroscopy. The study of supercontinuum sources is based on nonlinear ultrashort pulse propagation in tellurite glass (80TeO2-10ZnO-10Na2O) and used in three different forms, namely a thin bulk sample, a microstructured suspended-core fiber, and a tapered suspended-core fiber. These technical means adapt themselves to distinct laser sources commercially available, thus optimizing the implementation of ultrawide-band infrared light sources. Experimental observations are compared to corresponding numerical simulations, thus pointing out the different underlying physical mechanisms of supercontinuum generation. The first study reports the filamentation-induced supercontinuum source in the tellurite glass bulk sample by means of a high-energy femtosecond laser (several micro-Joules) and associated with a complete spectro-angular mapping of light distribution. Then, the main task is related to supercontinuum generation in microstructured suspended-core fibers (with or without tapering) using nano-Joule femtosecond laser sources. A complete analysis of the fiber design was performed, especially to enhance linear and nonlinear wave propagation for efficient frequency conversion processes. As a result, a supercontinuum source covering the 0.6-3.3 µm region (i.e., 400-THz spectral bandwidth) is obtained in a 10-cm tapered fiber segment. Finally, another supercontinuum source covering the 0.9-2.6 µm region, pumped by a very compact fiber laser, was developed, in particular for its application in a gas detector system. The main goal is to explore absorption lines beyond 2 µm, which are known to be more intense and then easier to detect. A complete experimental setup for supercontinuum absorption spectroscopy based on a compact multi-pass cell was successfully developed for methane detection.