Fig. 1. Multi-port passively mode-locked fiber laser with vine-structure gain fiber. Experimental setup of the fiber laser. LD: laser diode; WDM: wavelength division multiplexer; EDF: erbium-doped fiber; SMF: single mode fiber; SA: saturable absorber; PC: polarization controller. The blue lines represent single mode fiber, and the orange lines represent EDF. Details of the vine-structure EDF with 7 output taps are depicted in the lower section.

Fig. 2. Experimental results of conventional soliton evolution within the cavity. (a) The spectral profile (black curve) at 10% port obtained by an optical spectrum analyzer, with an FWHM of 7.065 nm, along with the fitting results using the sech2 function (red dashed curve). (b) The temporal profile (black dotted curve) at 10% port obtained via autocorrelation, showing an FWHM of 1.332 ps, with the fitting results using the sech2 function (red curve). (c) The spectral intracavity evolution demonstrated by spectrum results from ports 1 to 11, with the position of the saturable absorber highlighted in yellow. (d) The evolution of the left sideband of the spectrum shown in (c). (e) The evolution of the right sideband of the spectrum in (c). (f) The evolution of spectral bandwidth (FWHM, red squares) and pulse energy (FWHM, blue dots) along the cavity. (g) The evolution of the sideband energy percentage relative to the total energy (green squares for the left sideband and blue dots for the right sideband), along with the evolution of the spectral position difference between the left and right sidebands.

Fig. 3. Experimental results of soliton intracavity evolution corresponding to four net dispersion values. The spectral intracavity evolution demonstrated by spectrum results from ports is demonstrated in the upper and the evolution of spectral bandwidth (red squares) and pulse energy (blue dots) along the cavity in the bottom. The positions of the EDF and saturable absorber are highlighted in green and yellow, respectively. (a) Dispersion management soliton evolution in the anomalous net dispersion regime. (b) Dispersion management soliton evolution in the slightly normal net dispersion regime. (c) Self-similar soliton evolution in the normal net dispersion regime. (d) Dissipative soliton evolution in the largely normal net dispersion regime.

Fig. 4. Measured spectrum (black curves) and autocorrelation traces (black dotted curves) of solitons. Fitted profiles of the spectrum (dashed curves) and time duration (red curves) differentiate the soliton type. (a) Dispersion management soliton at the anomalous GVD regime. (b) Dispersion management soliton at normal GVD regime. (c) Self-similar soliton. (d) Dissipative soliton.

Fig. 5. Simulated results of intracavity evolution of different solitons along the dispersion map. The upper part of each depicts evolution of soliton (heatmap) and the energy evolution (white curve); the lower part depicts the bandwidth (blue curve) and pulse duration (red curve) evolution. (a) Conventional soliton. (b) Dispersion management soliton in anomalous net dispersion regime. (c) Dispersion management soliton in normal net dispersion regime. (d) Self-similar soliton. (e) Self-similar soliton with slightly larger net normal dispersion. (f) Dissipative soliton.

Fig. 6. The spectral (blue dots) and temporal intracavity breathing ratio (orange squares) with respect to net dispersion from anomalous to normal; the inset is the time bandwidth product (green diamonds).