Passively mode-locked 914-nm Nd:YVO4 laser

We demonstrate what is to our knowledge the first mode-locked Nd:YVO4 laser operating on the 4F3/2-4I9/2 transition at 914 nm. Using a semiconductor saturable-absorber mirror for passive mode locking, we have obtained 3-ps pulses at a repetition rate of 233.8 MHz. The laser is based on a standard delta cavity and is pumped by a Ti:sapphire laser. We obtained an average output power of 42 mW through one mirror and an accumulated output power of approximately 150 mW (through all cavity mirrors) at a pump power of 1.4 W.     

Excited-state absorption and 1064-nm end-pumped laser emission of Nd:YVO4 single-crystal fiber grown by laser-heated pedestal growth

We present an investigation of the excited-state absorption and laser emission of a 1.0-at. %-Nd3+-doped YVO4 single-crystal fiber grown by the low-cost and versatile laser-heated pedestal growth technique. Efficient laser emission at 1064 nm was achieved when the fiber was pumped, in an end-pump cavity, by a Ti:sapphire laser at 808 nm. A continuous-wave threshold of 10 mW was observed with an efficiency of 42% with respect to the absorbed pump power and the maximum output power of 200 mW. These results are excellent when compared with those of a commercial bulk crystal adapted to the same cavity (48% efficiency, 250-mW maximum output power). Thus the fibers are characterized as strong candidates for the construction of compact lasers that can also be pumped by low-cost diode lasers.     

Surface hardening of titanium by pulsed Nd:YAG laser irradiation at 1064- and 532-nm wavelengths in nitrogen atmosphere

The surface hardness of titanium modified by laser irradiation at different wavelengths in nitrogen atmosphere was investigated. Further, surface characteristics such as morphology, chemical state, and chemical composition in the depth direction were also studied. The size and depth of the craters observed in the laser-irradiated spots increased monotonically with an increase in the laser power. Furthermore, the crater formed by the 532-nm laser was deeper than that formed by the 1064-nm laser for the same laser power. Laser power beyond a certain threshold value was required to obtain a titanium nitride layer. When the laser power exceeds the threshold value, a titanium nitride layer of a few tens of nanometers in thickness was formed on the substrate, whereas a titanium oxide layer containing small amounts of nitrogen was formed when the laser power is below the threshold value. Thus, it was shown that laser irradiation using appropriate laser parameters can successfully harden a titanium substrate, and the actual hardness of the titanium nitride layer, measured by nanoindentation, was approximately five times that of an untreated titanium surface.     

二极管泵浦1064nm单频Nd:YVO4激光器的研究

报道了一种用国产激光二极管泵浦的1064nm单频NdYVO4红外激光器的设计.利用布氏片和石英晶体组合构成的双折射滤光片技术,在泵浦功率为800mW时,实现了功率为360mW的1064nm红外单频输出.测量结果表明,偏振比超过了10001,功率稳定性优于0.5%,振幅噪声小于0.1%.     

Influence of neodymium concentration on the strength of thermal effects in continuous-wave diode-pumped Nd:YVO4 lasers at 1064 nm

The influence of neodymium ion concentration on the continuous-wave power performance of diode-pumped Nd:YVO₄ lasers was experimentally investigated by using three crystals of approximately the same total absorption but different Nd concentrations of 0.5, 1, and 3 at.%. In situ measurements indicate that strong thermal lensing occurs in the highly doped sample (3 at.% Nd) and precludes scaling of the output power to large values. Results also show that undesirable thermal effects are dramatically reduced with decreasing active-ion concentration. The best power performance was obtained with a 10-mm-long Nd:YVO₄ sample that had 0.5 at.% Nd. In this case, up to 6.5 W of continuous-wave output power was obtained at 1064 nm by using a 3% transmitting output coupler.     

YVO4晶体及其掺Nd的喇曼光谱

本文报道了对YVO4晶体及其掺Nd的喇曼光谱的测量结果,用这些结果可以了解到这种材料的声子能谱情况,在与其它基质材料比较中可以看出它的特点是：分立的低声子在500－800cm^-1之间有一个间隙,主要部分分布在800－900cm^-1附近,根据群论分析可以得出各喇曼谱线相应的对称性,而且可看出这些喇曼谱线主要来源于VO4^3-的振动,对这种不均匀分布的声子能变对于其光谱性能可能产生的影响也作了分析讨论,测量结果还发现掺杂能抑制原有的高能声子。     

532-nm picosecond pulse generated in a passively mode-locked Nd:YVO_4 laser

A diode-pumped continuous-wave （CW） mode-locked Nd：YVO4/KTP green laser with semiconductor saturable absorber mirror （SESAM） is demonstrated. The maximum output power of CW mode-locked green laser is obtained to be 552 mW at the incident pump power of 7.25 W, corresponding to an opticai-optical conversion efficiency of about 7.6%. The 532-nm CW mode-locked pulse duration is estimated to be about 8.4 ps with the repetition rate of 87 MHz.     

Laser-ionization mass-spectrometric studies on laser ablation of a nitrogen-rich polymer at 532 nm and 1064 nm

Laser-ionization Time-Of-Flight (TOF) mass-spectrometric studies have been carried out on the 532 nm and 1064 nm laser ablation products from a nitrogen-rich polymer. The polymer used had an elemental composition of C_6.0N_8.9H_3.4 and consisted of C=N, C-N, and N-H chemical bonds. The TOF mass spectra observed were composed of various peaks (150 amu) depending on the ablation laser wavelength. The primary peaks were assigned to C⁺, CN⁺, CHnN⁺ ₂ (n=1–3) and C₂H₂N⁺ ₃ for 532 nm ablation, and C⁺, C⁺ ₃, HCN⁺, HCCN⁺, CH₂NH⁺, HNCN⁺, H₃NCN⁺, and C₄H₄N⁺ ₇ for 1064 nm ablation. The flight velocity distributions with peak velocities ranging from 8.6×10³ cm/s to 3.8×10⁴ cm/s were measured for these products. The distinct velocity distributions observed between small and large products indicate the presence of two origins in the fragment ejection process from the polymer for both 532 nm and 1064 nm ablation. Furthermore, we suggest an importance of the translational energy of the fragments for the product generation in the laser plume.     

Experimental determination of effective stimulated emission cross-section in a diode pumped Nd:YVO4 micro-laser at 1064 nm with various doping concentrations

A practical method is described and used for determination of the effective stimulated emission cross-section (σ_e) in an operating diode pumped Nd:YVO₄ micro-laser at 1064 nm with various doping concentrations. In this method a micro-laser is formed by keeping a small piece of the sample in a plane–plane resonator under semi-monolithic configuration and a fiber coupled diode laser (808 nm) was used for pumping. The pump power induced thermal lensing effect was used to make the cavity stable. In thermally stabilized solid-state lasers the cavity parameters change dynamically with the pump power and hence the overlap integrals become a function of the absorbed pump power. In our method the overlap integrals were estimated by measuring the thermal lens focal length at the threshold. The value of σ_e of Nd:YVO₄ crystal with different doping concentrations obtained by this method were in well agreement with the reported values.     

高稳定LD泵浦腔内倍频Nd∶YVO4/KTP连续绿光激光器

设计出一种能够较好地补偿激光晶体热效应的激光谐振腔，实现了高稳定LD单端泵浦KTP腔内倍频Nd∶YVO₄连续绿光激光器.当晶体吸收的泵浦功率为24.56 W时，532 nm激光功率达到5.3 W，光-光转换效率达到21.6％，激光模式为TEM00模.在输出功率5W左右时，激光器1 h功率不稳定度优于0.6％     

纵向泵浦的1.34μm Nd:YVO4平凹腔型DPSL器件

报道了激光二极管泵浦的Nd:YVO4激光器,分析了激光器的各项参数.在泵浦功率为7.06W时,获得1.34μm激光输出功率2.008W,光-光转换效率达28.4%.     

Effect of Nd3+ concentration on CW and pulsed performance of fiber-coupled diode laser pumped Nd:YVO4 laser at 1064 nm

The effect of Nd³⁺ concentration on the CW and Q-switched laser performances at 1064 nm from Nd: YVO₄ has been studied under diode laser pumping in identical laser configuration. The Nd³⁺ concentrations used were 1, 2 and 3 at.% in YVO₄ crystals. Under the CW operations we have compared the thermal lensing effect, slope efficiencies and also the beam quality at the fourth-order degeneracy configuration. Q-switching was done with the help of an acousto-optic modulator and we have compared the pulses obtained from Nd: YVO₄ laser with different doping concentration. It was found that the 1 at.%-doped crystal is the best, offering highest optical-to-optical conversion efficiency (55%), lowest fractional heat load (24%), highest pulse energy (80 μJ) and shortest pulse width (20 ns). It was also found that there was not much difference in performances for 2 and 3 at.%-doped crystals both in CW and Q-switched configurations.     

Study on optical characteristics of Nd:YVO4/YVO4 composite crystal laser

Thermal effect in crystals is the main obstacle blocking diode-pumped solid state laser to get high and stable output power. Diffusion bonding crystal has been demonstrated to be an effective method to relieve the thermal lensing theoretically based on the numerical heat analysis to the end-pumped anisotropic laser crystal. The temperature distributions in Nd:YVO4/YVO4 composite crystal and conventional crystal were analyzed and compared. The end-pumped Nd:YVO4/YVO4 composite crystal laser was designed and set up with z-cavity. The maximum output powers of 9.87 W at 1064 nm and 6.14 W at 532 nm were obtained at the incident pump power of 16.5 W. The highest optical-optical conversion efficiencies were up to 59.8% at 1064 nm and 37.2% at 532 nm respectively.     

1064 nm Nd:YVO4 laser intracavity pumped at 912 nm and sum-frequency mixing for an emission at 491 nm

We present for the first time a Nd:YVO(4) laser emitting at 1064 nm intracavity pumped at 912 nm by a Nd:GdVO(4) laser. We carried out a model to design the system properly, and laser performance was experimentally investigated. Intracavity sum-frequency mixing at 912 and 1064 nm was then realized in a BiBO crystal to reach the blue range. We obtained a cw output power of 155 mW at 491 nm with a pump laser diode emitting 20 W at 808 nm.     

激光二极管抽运Nd:YV04和频黄光激光器的理论及实验研究

为了达到最佳和频593 nm黄色激光输出,采用激光二极管(LD)端面抽运Nd:YVO4晶体,根据四能级系统的速率方程理论,建立了空间相关的两波长激光运转速率方程模型,由此导出两波光子数表达式.对LD端面抽运Nd:YVO4/KTP三镜复合腔结构的腔内和频黄光激光器,在满足参与和频的两基频光光子数密度相等的条件下,理论上得到了谐振腔的各个参数.实验比较了在满足两波光子数密度相等和两波振荡阈值相等两种情况下激光器输出的593 nm黄色激光功率.在抽运功率为12 W时,二种情况下分别得到了410 mW和340 mW的黄光输出,光一光转换效率分别为3.4%和2.8%.由此可见,在满足两波光子数密度相等的条件下可以得到更高转换效率的和频黄光输出.     

Laser performance of grown-together YVO4/Nd:YVO4 composite crystal at continuous-wave 914 nm

We demonstrated a diode-end-pumped continuous-wave 914 nm laser using a novel grown-together YVO₄/Nd:YVO₄ crystal for the first time. A maximum output power at 914 nm of 7.5 W with an optical-optical efficiency of 16.3% and a slope efficiency of 24.3% was obtained when the incident pump power was 46.2 W. The beam quality factor M ² was 3.2 at the output power of 6.0 W. The quality and specification of the grown-together composite YVO₄/Nd:YVO₄ crystal should be improved. Meanwhile, energy-transfer upconversion spectrum of the composite YVO₄/Nd:YVO₄ crystal laser was also investigated.     

端面抽运四镜折叠腔Nd∶YVO4激光器的研究

基于传输矩阵理论,针对端面抽运的z型折叠腔Nd∶YVO4固体激光器的谐振腔设计进行了数值模拟,详细分析了腔内各参量对谐振腔稳定性的影响.由模拟结果推断,z型腔激光器具有两个稳区,并且稳区的范围可通过谐振腔各分臂的臂长来调节.利用相同的光学元件在不同的稳区范围设计了两种热稳腔,指出了长短腔型各自的利弊.实验考察了输出功率随腔长改变的变化情况,在不同腔长下的不同稳区分别获得了稳定的1 342 nm激光输出,谐振腔稳区范围的变化规律与理论计算基本符合.     

Intensity noise of injected Nd:YVO 4 microchip lasers

The combined effects of the pump noise suppression and injection locking technique on the intensity noise of a diode pumped Nd:YVO₄ microchip laser are theoretically and experimentally investigated. Complete cancellation of the relaxation oscillation peak is experimentally achieved. Very good agreement between experimental results and theoretical predictions of a fully quantum model describing lasers with injected signal is found. Received 10 December 2001 and Received in final form 6 March 2002     

Nd:YVO4激光晶体Raman光谱的分析

根据商群对称性分析法对Nd :YVO4 晶体的Raman光谱做了理论计算和指认 ,运用实验的手段 ,根据谱线数目判定其合理性 ,同时断定晶体原胞中含有 4个Nd :YVO4 分子     

二极管激光泵浦Nd：YVO4激光器的频率调谐特性研究

用加热法和压电陶瓷ＰＺＴ调腔的方法，实现二极管激光泵浦的单频运转１０６４ｎｍ２％Ｎｄ：ＹＶＯ４激光器调谐。调谐范围４７．４ＧＨｚ，增益峰漂移引起的激光频率温度系数２ｖ／２Ｔ＝－１．０４ＧＨｚ／℃，压电陶瓷调谐系数１５０ＭＨｚ／Ｖ。研究了加热影响件性能的情况。