Apparatus and method for the generation of supercontinuum pulses

1. An optical pulse source for generating optical supercontinuum pulses, comprising:

an optical pump laser operable to generate a number of optical pump pulses at a pump pulse repetition rate;

a nonlinear optical element arranged to receive optical pump pulses and configured to generate therefrom optical supercontinuum pulses;

a gating device provided between the pump laser and the nonlinear optical element and operable to selectively limit the number of optical pump pulses received by the nonlinear optical element in order to generate optical supercontinuum pulses at a user selectable repetition rate lower than the pump pulse repetition rate;

a wavelength-tunable optical bandpass filter configured to receive at least one optical supercontinuum pulse and to wavelength filter the at least one optical supercontinuum pulse at a predetermined wavelength; and

wherein the wavelength-tunable optical bandpass filter is configured to receive a plurality of optical supercontinuum pulses in a pulse set and to wavelength filter each pulse at a respective one of a corresponding plurality of predetermined wavelengths, to thereby form a wavelength-interleaved optical continuum pulse set.

2. An optical pulse source according to claim 1 wherein the wavelength-tunable optical bandpass filter is configured to filter a plurality of the optical supercontinuum pulse sets in series to thereby form a repeating wavelength-interleaved optical supercontinuum pulse set.

3. An optical pulse source for generating optical supercontinuum pulses, comprising:

an optical pump laser operable to generate a number of optical pump pulses at a pump pulse repetition rate;

a nonlinear optical element arranged to receive optical pump pulses and configured to generate therefrom optical supercontinuum pulses;

a gating device provided between the pump laser and the nonlinear optical element and operable to selectively limit the number of optical pump pulses received by the nonlinear optical element in order to generate optical supercontinuum pulses at a user selectable repetition rate lower than the pump pulse repetition rate; and

wherein the optical pulse source further comprises a second gating device provided after the nonlinear optical element.

4. An optical pulse source according to claim 3 , wherein the second gating device comprises an acousto-optical modulator, a wavelength-tunable optical bandpass filter, or an acousto-optic tunable filter.

5. An optical pulse source according to claim 3 , wherein the second gating device is operable to reduce the optical intensity of one or more optical supercontinuum pulses.

6. A method of allowing a user to select the repetition rate of optical supercontinuum pulses generated by a source of optical supercontinuum pulses, comprising:

generating a number of optical pump pulses having an associated repetition rate and a duration with a pump pulse source;

gating the optical pump pulses to reduce the repetition rate;

introducing the gated optical pump pulses into a nonlinear optical element and generating therefrom optical supercontinuum pulses at the reduced repetition rate, wherein the user can select the reduced repetition rate;

where the optical supercontinuum pulses have an associated energy, and the method further comprises scaling the optical supercontinuum pulse energy by increasing the pump pulse duration as well as said gating to reduce the pump pulse repetition rate.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein scaling the energy of optical supercontinuum pulses further comprises reducing the repetition rate to less than 20 MHz and increasing the optical pump pulse duration to greater than 10 picoseconds.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the pump pulse duration is increased to at least 200 picoseconds.

9. An optical pulse source for generating optical supercontinuum pulses, comprising:

an optical pump laser operable to generate a number of optical pump pulses at a pump pulse repetition rate;

a nonlinear optical element arranged to receive optical pump pulses and configured to generate therefrom optical supercontinuum pulses;

a gating device provided between the pump laser and the nonlinear optical element and operable to selectively limit the number of optical pump pulses received by the nonlinear optical element in order to generate optical supercontinuum pulses at a user selectable repetition rate lower than the pump pulse repetition rate; and

wherein the optical pulse source is configured to generate output optical supercontinuum pulses at a repetition rate in the range 1 MHz to 10 MHz with an energy spectral density of at least 100 picojoules per nanometer, and the optical pulse source is configured to provide an illumination source for a stimulated emission depletion (STED) microscope.

10. An optical pulse source according to claim 9 , wherein the optical pulse source further comprises a controller configured to scale the energy of the optical supercontinuum pulses by reducing the pump pulse repetition rate of the optical pump laser and increasing the pump pulse duration.

11. An optical pulse source according to claim 9 , wherein the optical pump pulse repetition rate is less than 20 MHz, and the optical pump pulses have a duration of at least 200 picoseconds.

12. An optical pulse source according to claim 9 , wherein the STED microscope is fluorescence-based, and wherein the illumination source provides excitation illumination and stimulated emission illumination.

13. A method of allowing a user to select the repetition rate of optical supercontinuum pulses generated by a source of optical supercontinuum pulses, comprising:

generating a number of optical pump pulses having an associated repetition rate and a duration with a pump pulse source;

gating the optical pump pulses to reduce the repetition rate;

introducing the gated optical pump pulses into a nonlinear optical element and generating therefrom optical supercontinuum pulses at the reduced repetition rate wherein the user can select the reduced repetition rate; and

the method further comprising making use of the optical supercontinuum pulses to perform fluorescent lifetime imaging (FLIM), time correlated fluorescence single photon counting (TCSPC), or stimulated emission depletion (STED) microscopy.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein making use of the optical supercontinuum pulses comprises performing FLIM.

15. The method of claim 13 , wherein making use of the optical supercontinuum pulses comprises performing STED microscopy.

16. The method of claim 13 , wherein making use of the optical supercontinuum pulses comprises performing TCSPC.

17. The method of claim 13 , comprising amplifying the gated optical pump pulses before introducing the gated optical pump pulses to the nonlinear optical element.

18. The method of claim 17 , comprising amplifying the optical pump pulses before gating the optical pump pulses to reduce the repetition rate.

19. The method of claim 17 , wherein amplifying the gated optical pump pulses comprises amplifying the gated optical pump pulses with an optical fiber amplifier wherein the peak power of a pulse that can be amplified is clamped, and wherein the duration of the gated optical pulses is selected such that the peak power of the gated optical pulses is within the peak power clamp.

20. The method of claim 19 , wherein the duration of the gated optical pulses is hundreds of picosceconds.

21. The method of claim 20 comprising making use of the supercontinuum pulses to perform STED microscopy.

22. A method of generating optical supercontinuum pulses having increased spectral energy density, comprising:

generating a number of optical pump pulses having an associated repetition rate;

gating the optical pump pulses to reduce the repetition rate;

amplifying the gated optical pump pulses with an optical fiber amplifier wherein the pulse energy is fixed; and

introducing the amplified and gated optical pump pulses into a nonlinear optical element and generating therefrom optical supercontinuum pulses at the reduced repetition rate.

23. The method of claim 22 , wherein generating the optical pump pulses comprises generating optical pump pulses with a mode locked optical fiber oscillator.