Tin diselenide as a new saturable absorber for generation of laser pulses at 1μm

The nonlinear optical responses of two-dimensional (2D) few-layer tin diselenide (SnSe2) have been investigated in this work. By applying the Z-scan technique, the saturable absorption of SnSe2 thin film has been observed at a wavelength of similar to 1 mu m, which enables SnSe2, a new saturable absorber for pulsed laser generation. A detailed exploration of the nonlinear absorption of SnSe2 film and their dependence on excitation pulse energy is carried out. Our results show that saturation intensity of the nonlinear absorption is similar to 23.78 GW/cm(2) and corresponding nonlinear absorption coefficients are at a range from -13596 to -2967.3 cm/GW. By employing the SnSe2-coated mirror as a saturable absorber, the passively Q-switched lasing has been achieved on a crystalline waveguide platform at similar to 1 mu m. (C) 2017 Optical Society of America