Chirped fiber Bragg gratings written with ultrashort pulses and a tunable phase mask

We report a fabrication technique for chirped fiber Bragg gratings (CFBGs) using a flexible setup based on a poly(methyl-methacrylate) phase mask. The period of the phase mask can be thermally tuned during the inscription process, allowing the grating period of uniform fiber Bragg gratings to be shifted about 7 nm by a temperature change of 74 K. In addition, CFBGs with bandwidths up to 2 nm are demonstrated in non-photosensitive fibers by IR femtosecond inscription.