Fiber -based laser transmitter and laser spectroscopy of the oxygen A-band for remote detection of atmospheric pressure

The Author reports on the design and construction of an oxygen spectroscopy laser sounding instrument designed to measure atmospheric pressure. This instrument was conceived and designed with a satellite application in mind so we discuss the requirements this places on the instrument and specifically the laser transmitter. We have developed a novel, pulsed, frequency-doubled, fiber-based laser transmitter for use in the instrument. The instrument concept uses the collision broadening of spectroscopic lines of the diatomic oxygen A-band to deduce atmospheric pressure. We report on the spectroscopic and instrument theory. We discuss the development of a high-power, narrow-frequency, tunable, single spatial mode pulsed laser transmitter. The transmitter is a master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) design. The master oscillator is a fiber coupled DFB laser with external acousto-optic modulation. The amplifier is a diode pumped, erbium-doped fiber. We discuss the non-linear optical effect of stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) and how it limits the transmitter performance. We review various methods for overcoming SBS in erbium fiber amplifiers and then demonstrate the performance of a high SBS threshold fiber amplifier. We demonstrate the efficacy of this transmitter by integrating it into a spectroscopic instrument and make atmospheric measurements at a test site at Goddard. We also discuss future improvements