Advances, Challenges and Prospects of Visible Fiber Lasers in Display Technologies

Especially for displays, visible-wavelength lasers are in high demand for a wide range of applications. Active research and development have been devoted to laser-based displays over the past six decades, but the technology's commercial viability has been limited primarily by the high cost and bulk of laser sources. Owing to their reliability, cost-effectivity, and high efficiency, fiber lasers are rapidly becoming the preferred technology for displays. Advances in visible fiber laser techniques, such as nonlinear conversion, upconversion pumping, and direct pumping, are addressed in detail in this review. The potential of visible rare-earth-doped fiber lasers to generate high-power continuous-wave (CW) emission at wavelengths of red, green, blue, and yellow (RGBY) is encouraging, given the recent developments in newly designed active fibers, dielectric end-coated fiber technology, and high-brightness GaN pump diodes. Following this, constraints on the scaling of power in visible fiber lasers are analyzed and discussed. Finally, potential applications of visible fiber lasers as a light source in display technologies are discussed.