Efficient mechanically Q-switched diode side pumped Nd:YAG laser using a rotating prism and mirror combination

In this paper the construction of a mechanically Q-switched diode side pumped Nd:YAG laser system is described. It consists of a 50 cm long plane-plane resonator Q-switched with a combination of a rotating prism and a mirror. With an optical to optical efficiency of 25% Q-switched pulses (@1064) of 48 mJ and 8 ns are obtained at a rep-rate of 30 Hz with an output in near TEMoo mode. At a peak power of 6 MW the M ² value is found to be 1.92. The laser is frequency doubled and then tested on a 50 ??m thick tantalum foil which results in circular holes of diameter 13 ??m in it.     

Stable and Efficient Pulsed Mid-Infrared Laser Generation from an Er<Superscript>3+</Superscript>-Doped ZBLAN Fiber Laser

We demonstrate a stable and efficient passively Q-switched 2.8 μm Er³⁺-doped ZBLAN fiber laser with a broadband semiconductor saturable absorber mirror. Enabled by the broadband optical modulator, the stable Q-switched fiber laser can deliver a maximum average power over 700 mW with corresponding per-pulse energy of 8.19 μJ and a pulse width of 1.3 μs at a repetition rate of 88.6 kHz under an incident pump power of 3.8 W. In addition, the slope efficiency can reach 22.5%. To the best of our knowledge, this is the highest reported slope efficiency for the passively Q-switched Er³⁺-doped ZBLAN fiber laser.     

Narrow pulse width and high power passively Q-switched Nd3+:Gd3Ga5O12 laser with Cr4+:YAG saturable absorber

A compact, diode-pumped passively Q-switched Nd³⁺:Gd₃Ga₅O₁₂ (Nd:GGG) laser with Cr⁴⁺:YAG saturable absorber has been successfully demonstrated. Stable Q-switched pulses with pulse energy of 100 ??J and high peak power of 14 kW have been obtained. The pulse width was as short as 7 ns with low repetition rate of 10 kHz. The dependence of pulse width, pulse repetition rate, pulse energy and pulse peak power on pump power have been measured respectively. Experimental results reveal that the Nd:GGG crystal with Cr⁴⁺:YAG saturable absorber is suitable for narrow pulse width and high power passively Q-switched lasers.     

Simultaneous Q-switching and mode-locking in the CW Nd: YAG laser

The theory of transient mode-locking for an active modulator in a laser with a homogeneously broadened line is presented. The theory is applied to simultaneously Q-switched and mode-locked Nd:YAG lasers and good agreement between theory and experiment is obtained. The main conclusion is that under usual Q-switched operating conditions the mode-locking process does not have sufficient time to build up to steady-state conditions. We also present a method to overcome this problem by allowing the laser to prelase before the Q-switch is opened. Mode-locked pulses whose width approaches the steady-state value are obtained. The transient mode-locking theory presented here also applies to actively mode-locking TEA CO₂ lasers and to other types of simultaneously pulsed and mode-locked lasers.     

1 mJ Passively Q-switched Nd:YAB laser using a V:YAG crystal

We describe the design and operation of a diode-pumped compact and efficient Nd:YAB laser operating at 1338 nm. We use a passive Q-switch V:YAG crystal to achieve 1 mJ Q-switched pulses at the laser output. The laser elaborated provides an average power of 1.5 W in the CW regime and 1 W in Qswitched mode with an optical efficiency of 15 and 10%, respectively. A 65 mm plano-concave cavity is formed with an output in the TEM₀₀ mode. At a pulse width of 15 ns, the achieved peak power is 66 kW.     

914 nm LD end-pumped 31.8 W high beam quality E-O Q-switched Nd:YVO4 laser without intracavity polarizer

We report a 914 nm LD end-pumped high power, high beam quality (M _x ² = 1.378, M _y ² = 1.287) electro-optical Q-switched Nd:YVO₄ laser with TEM₀₀-mode output. At the absorbed pump power of 67.6 W, a 31.8 W 1064 nm Q-switched laser with 43 ns pulse duration was achieved at 100 kHz repetition rate, corresponding to an optical-to-optical efficiency of 47%. The maximum pulse energy and shortest pulse width were 1.67 mJ and 18.5 ns at 10 kHz, and the calculated peak power was 90.3 kW. To the best of our knowledge, this is the highest Q-switched output power ever obtained for a Nd:YVO₄ oscillator pumped at 914 nm.     

Continuous-wave and Q-switched Operation of a Tm,Ho:YAP ring laser

We demonstrated continuous-wave (CW) and Q-switched operation of a Tm,Ho:YAP ring laser at 77 K. The maximum CW output power of 2 W at 2130.7 nm was obtained under the incident pump power of 12 W, corresponding to a slope efficiency of 23% and an optical-to-optical efficiency of 16.7%. For the Q-switched regime the maximum output energy of 5 mJ with the pulse width of 160 ns at the repetition rate of 100 Hz was achieved, corresponding to a peak power of 31.25 kW.     

High-Power in-Band Pumped a-Cut Ho:Yap Laser

We report the continuous wave and acousto-optically Q-switched operation of an in-pumped a-cut Ho:YAP laser at room temperature. We obtained a continuous-wave output power of 17.2 W at 2118 nm under an absorbed pump power of 29.8 W, corresponding to a slope efficiency of 63.2 %. For the Q-switched mode, we achieved a maximum pulse energy of about 1.7 mJ and a minimum pulse width of 24 ns at a repetition rate of 10 kHz, resulting in a peak power of 70.8 kW.     

AOM fourfold pass for efficient Q-switching and stable high peak power laser pulses

We report on a scheme for efficient acousto-optical Q-switching. A flash lamp pumped Nd:YAG oscillator with an acousto-optic modulator (AOM) fourfold pass configuration is presented. The setup combines two important advantages: enhancement of the diffraction efficiency by additional AOM passes and a compact oscillator design in spite of an extension of the optical path length. A flash lamp pumped oscillator with an average output power of 7 W and a beam quality of M² = 1.2 is developed. The system operates with a 100 Hz repetition rate for the flash lamps. In each pumping pulse a pulse train of 1 up to 40 Q-switched laser pulses is generated. The pulse duration is from 15 to 120 ns. In comparison to a former setup (AOM double pass) the AOM fourfold pass configuration allows single pulses with energy above 20 mJ and a pulse peak power of more than 1 MW. In addition, the beam profile is improved due to a better separation of the incident and diffracted beam caused by the AOM. The laser is dedicated as master oscillator in a master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) system where pulse peak powers in the MW range should be achieved.     

High-efficiency continuous-wave and Q-switched operation of a resonantly pumped Ho:YAP ring laser

We demonstrated continuous-wave (CW) and Q-switched operation of a room-temperature Ho:YAP ring laser that is resonantly end-pumped by a diode-pumped Tm:YLF laser at 1.91 ??m. Continuous wave output power of 3 W at 2119 nm is obtained under the absorbed pump power of 10.17 W, corresponding to a slope efficiency of 60%. For the Q-switched regime the maximum pulse energy of 1.58 mJ and the minimum pulse width of 590 ns at the repetition rate of 1 kHz are achieved.     

Operation of electro-optically Q-switched Nd:LuAG laser at 1064 nm

We present the operation of a diode-pumped high-power electro-optically Q-switched 4 W Nd:LuAG laser operating at 1064 nm. At an absorbed optical power of 20 W, the laser described provides a maximum output of 3.5 W average power at a repetition rate of 50 Hz. The output varies up to a factor of 1.3% for about 1 h operation with a peak power of 280 kW, with the laser beam quality in the TEM00 mode.     

Modeling and experimental investigation of short pulse Raman microchip laser

The results of experimental and theoretical investigations of passive Q-switch Raman microchip lasers based on Nd³⁺:LSB active medium and Ba(NO₃)₂ Raman crystal are presented. It has been demonstrated that intracavity Raman conversion in the microchip lasers is a simple and efficient method, capable of delivering high power pulses with sub-100 ps duration. Intracavity generation of the 1st Stokes pulses with duration from 180 down to 48 ps and a peak power of 48 kW has been performed and studied. High peak power and short duration of the 1st Stokes pulses in microchip laser with Ba(NO₃)₂ Raman crystal allows to easily perform extracavity harmonic generation and frequency sum mixing in LBO, BBO, and KTP crystals with discrete-tunable wavelength from ∼1200 down to ∼240 nm. We have developed a generalized model of Q-switched Raman microchip lasers, that takes into account spatial inhomogeneity of pump, laser, and Stokes beams, thermalization within the upper and lower multiplets of activator ions in laser medium, and saturable absorber bleaching and recovery. For the microchip lasers with different saturable absorbers, the model achieves very good agreement with the presented experimental results in a wide range of pump powers.     

A compact diode-pumped Q-switched and mode-locked Nd:GdVO4 laser based on SESAM

We report a compact passively Q-switched and Mode-locked Nd:GdVO₄ laser based on a semiconductor saturable absorber mirrors (SESAM). At a pump power of 12 W, the average output power was obtained to be 1.8 W with the repetition rate of the Q-witched envelope 80 kHz and 500 ns pulse width. The mode-locked pulses interval within the Q-switched envelope was about 1ns, corresponding to the high repetition of 1 GHz.     

二极管泵浦被动调Q Nd:YAG/ KTP绿光激光器

报道了LD泵浦的Nd:YAG/KTP/Cr:YAG结构被动调Q绿光激光器.当注入泵浦功率为750mW时,获得了平均功率38mW,脉冲宽度14.7ns,重复频率20.4kHz,峰值功率126.6W的调Q绿激光输出.     

A Single -Longitudinal-Mode Nd:Ce:YAG <Emphasis Type="Italic">Q</Emphasis>-Switched Laser Based on a Three-Plan Resonant Reflector

We present an efficient and compact passively Q-switched flash-lamp-pumped Nd:Ce:YAG singlelongitudinal-mode (SLM) laser system. With Cr⁴⁺:YAG as a saturable absorber, we design a three-plan resonant reflector for generating smooth SLM Q-switched pulses. We provide a theoretical calculation and optimization of the resonant reflector for improving the longitudinal-mode selection ability. We obtain a stable SLM output with a single-pulse energy of 10 mJ and a pulse width of 10.7 ns at 10 Hz. The near-diffraction-limited beam-quality parameter M² is less than 1.5. The system can operate with a repetition rate from 1 to 10 Hz. We achieve the stable laser operation with less than 3% fluctuation of the pulse energy within 10,000 shots.     

Doubly <Emphasis Type="Italic">Q</Emphasis>-Switched Nd:YAG Ceramic Laser

Using simultaneously both an acousto-optic (AO) modulator and a Cr⁴⁺:YAG saturable absorber in the cavity, we demonstrate for the first time the performance of a diode-pumped doubly Q-switched Nd:YAG ceramic laser. In contrast to purely acousto-optic Q-switched laser, this doubly Q-switched laser can generate shorter and more symmetric pulses. At an absorbed pump power of 10 W and a repetition rate of 20 kHz, the pulse width is compressed to 30 and 25 ns, respectively.     

Amplification of a <Emphasis Type="Italic">Q</Emphasis>-Switched Ho:GdVO<Subscript>4</Subscript> Oscillator in Thulium-Doped Large-Mode-Area Fiber

We report a high peak power, narrow linewidth, stable pulsed Ho:GdVO₄ amplifier based on thuliumdoped fiber, which produces 6.65 W average output power at 2,048 nm and 56.8 kW peak power with 11.7 ns pulse width at 10 kHz repetition rate. We use a simple Q-switched Ho:GdVO₄ laser as a seed laser and a thulium-doped fiber pumped by a 792 nm laser diode as an amplifier. The fiber amplifier provided 6.5 dB gain to the input signal. The spectral linewidth of the Ho:GdVO₄ amplifier remains < 0.5 nm with an M² beam quality of 1.36.     

窄线宽线形腔调Q双包层掺钕光纤激光器

对LD泵浦调Q双包层掺Nd³⁺光纤激光器进行了实验研究.在Littrow结构的体光栅与二向色镜构成的线形腔结构中,利用声光Q开关(AQM)调Q,在1064nm得到了光谱线宽约为0.08nm稳定的激光脉冲序列.脉冲重复频率从1kHz到10kHz可调.在重复频率1kHz时得到脉冲宽度约800ns,最大单脉冲能量180μJ,脉冲峰值功率225W,激光平均功率180mW,并对激光输出脉冲能量进行了计算,计算结果与实验符合很好.     

An Intracavity-Triggered Passively-Switched Nd:YVO<Subscript>4</Subscript> Laser

We demonstrate an intracavity-triggered passively Q-switched Nd:YVO₄ laser within a diode-end-pumped configuration. We employ a Cr⁴⁺:YAG saturable absorber as the passive Q switch and an Nd:LiYF₄ (YLF) laser as the laser triggering of the Q-switched laser. Since we use the same Cr⁴⁺:YAG crystal and output coupler with the Nd:YVO₄ laser, the Cr⁴⁺:YAG Q switch is triggered inside the Nd:YLF laser cavity. As a result, the timing jitter in standard deviation of Nd:YVO₄ laser can be reduced to 16 ns.     

A Diode-Pumped Actively Q-Switched and Injection-Seeded Tm:LuAG Laser at Room Temperature

We elaborate a diode-end-pumped actively Q-switched injection-seeded Tm:LuAG laser. To achieve power scaling with good beam quality, we construct a more flexible laser with longer cavity accommodated strongly aberrated thermal lens in a Tm:LuAG laser and took special care in designing the laser resonator. Under Q-switched operation, we achieve a maximum output energy of 2.6 mJ with a pulse width of 318.2 ns at a pulse repetition frequency of 50 Hz. To control the spectral, temporal, and phase characteristics of the Tm:LuAG laser, the ring laser is injected by a seed laser, which provides a 50 mW single longitudinal-mode laser output at a wavelength of 2,022.6 nm. We achieve an output energy of 1.8 mJ with a pulse width of 293.0 ns after employing the injection seed.