Low-pressure mercury lamp pumped atomic iodine laser of high efficiency

For single pulse operation it was demonstrated that a low-pressure mercury lamp can successfully pump the atomic iodine laser using the active medium CF₃I. For a 22 ms long pump pulse an output energy of 100 mJ emitted over the same time duration was obtained. Measured oscillator efficiency was 0.54%. With respect to stored optical energy an efficiency of 1.6% was realized, a value not obtained so far with any other pump source. Application to pulsed high repetition rate or cw-operation seems possible at equal or even better efficiency.