Liquid-phase exfoliated semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotubes as a saturable absorber for passively Q-switched laser

An economical way to extract semiconducting single-walled carbon nanotubes from common single-walled carbon nanotubes by the liquid-phase exfoliation method was demonstrated. Using the extracted samples as a saturable absorber, a passively Q-switched Nd : YVO4 laser was realized, delivering a pulse duration of 83 ns at a repetition rate of 290 kHz, resulting in a maximum peak power of 1.3 W. Such an outstanding saturable absorption might be caused by high diameter concordance and semi-conducting property.