516 mW,nanosecond Nd:LuAG laser Q-switched by gold nanorods

Q-switched operation of an Nd:LuAG laser using gold nanorods(GNRs) as the saturable absorber(SA) is reported, which also produces the highest average power among the nanosecond Nd-doped Q-switched lasers by GNRs-based SA. The applied GNRs are prepared using a seed-mediated growth method and then dropped onto the quartz substrate to fabricate the SA. The average power of the Q-switched laser is 516 mW with the shortest pulse duration of 606.7 ns and the repetition rate of 265.1 kHz.