Title: Fiber-based, Trace-gas, Laser Transmitter Technology Development for Space
Presenting Author: Mark Stephen
Organization: NASA GSFC
Co-Author(s): Anthony Yu, Brayler Gonzales, Kenji Numata, Jeffrey Chen, Stewart Wu, Molly Fahey, Mike Rodriguez, Bill Hasselbrack, Graham Allan, Anand Hariharan, Jeffrey W. Nicholson, William Mamakos, Brian Bean, Jim Abshire, Jonathan Klamkin

Abstract:
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is maturing the technology of a laser transmitter designed for use in atmospheric carbon dioxide remote-sensing. The ultimate goal is to make space-based satellite measurements with global coverage. To this end, we have built a ruggedized prototype to demonstrate the required power and performance that meets the environmental requirements imposed by launch and space operation. In this program we are working on a fiber-based master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) laser transmitter architecture. The seed laser is a wavelength-locked, single frequency, externally modulated distributed Bragg reflector (DBR) operating at 1572 nm followed by Er-doped amplifiers. The last amplifier stage is a polarization-maintaining, very-large-mode-area fiber with ~1,000 square microns effective area pumped by a Raman fiber laser. The optical output is single-frequency, one microsecond pulses with >450 µJ pulse energy, 7.5 KHz repetition rate, single spatial mode, and > 20 dB polarization extinction. We will show optical performance, packaging strategies and environmental test results.