Machine learning is a field of artificial intelligence that applies advanced techniques from statistics and numerical analysis to perform tasks without explicit programmed instructions. Recent years have seen dramatic impact of machine learning in society, with applications in health-care, autonomous vehicles, and language processing. The objective of this thesis is to apply techniques of machine learning to develop customized and programmable ultrafast lasers, and to develop deep learning (neural network) approaches to both aid in the design of the sources themselves, as well as to optimize the generation and propagation of these pulses in optical fibre.