The role of excited-state absorption in tunable solid-state lasers

The lasing properties of tunable solid state lasers can be strongly influenced by Excited State Absorption (ESA). It is shown that the tuning behaviour of Cr:GSGG and Cr:LLGG is limited at short wavelengths due to the ESA transitions²E ²T₂ (b),²T₁ (b) and⁴T₂ ⁴T₁ (b), respectively. At long wavelengths the⁴T₂ ⁴T₁ (a) ESA transition narrows the tuning range largely. The reason is that both levels are Jahn-Teller split due to the centric chromium site resulting in a very broad ESA band. In Ti: YAIO₃ strong ESA of the pumping wavelength into a charge transfer band occurs, which is caused by a Ti³⁺/Fe³⁺ complex centre. By this transition the pumping efficiency is diminished largely. It is believed that the lasing behaviour of Ti: YAIO₃ can be improved considerably by growing of highest iron-free crystals.     

Continuous wave 1.6 μm laser action in Er doped garnets at room temperature⋆

We report on room-temperature cw laser action of Er³⁺: Yttrium-aluminum-garnet (YAG) and Er³⁺: Yttrium-gallium-garnet (YGG) crystals at 1.64 m. The laser operates from the metastable⁴ I _13/2 manifold into an upper Stark level of the⁴ I _15/2 ground-state manifold of Er³⁺. Due to reabsorption losses, the Er³⁺ concentration of the laser crystals must be low. Laser pumping at a wavelength of 647.1 nm yields lowest thresholds around 30 mW and slope efficiencies up to 12.7% for Er:YAG. Laser operation in Er:YGG is achieved with higher thresholds of about 200 mW and smaller slope efficiencies of 0.9%. The effective emission cross section in YAG is estimated to be _e5×10^–21 cm².Dedicated to Prof. Dr. Herbert Welling on the occasion of his 60th birthday     

Pure-silica optical waveguides, fiber couplers, and high-aspect ratio submicrometer channels for electrokinetic separation devices

A new fabrication procedure for integration of ultraviolet transparent pure-silica planar waveguides, fiber couplers and high-aspect ratio submicrometer channels is presented. Only a single photolithographic mask step is required. The channels are 80-90 microm deep and the width can be reduced to about 0.5 microm, corresponding to a height-to-width ratio of more than 150. The core of the waveguides consists of pure silicon dioxide, which is favorable over doped silica, due to the absence of absorption centers associated with the dopants. This furthermore improves the long-term stability of the waveguides, because of an increased radiation resistance of the glass. The propagation loss decreases from 1.0 dB/cm at 200 nm to 0.2 dB/cm at 800 nm, which, to our knowledge, is the lowest propagation loss reported for integrated planar waveguides in the ultraviolet wavelength region to date. The effective optical path length is 1.2 mm for an absorbance cell with a nominal length of 1.0 mm, indicating effective suppression of stray light. The limit of detection for paracetamol when present in the entire channel network was determined to 3 microg/mL. Finally, the applicability of the fabricated devices for capillary electrophoresis was evaluated by separation of caffein, paracetamol and ketoprofone using absorbance detection at 254 nm.     

Characterization of polyethylene terephthalate by gel permeation chromatography (GPC)

The use of the solvent mixture chloroform/hexafluoroisopropanol (98 : 2 vol %) in the GPC-analysis of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) is described. PET-samples of different molecular weight have been prepared and characterized by light scattering, viscometry, and improved techniques of osmometry and end group titration. These well characterized samples were used in calibrating the GPC. The calibration with polydisperse standards was found superior to the universal calibration procedure in the solvent system chosen.