Solid state lasers, especially diode-pumped solid state (DPSS) lasers, have the advantages of compactness, high efficiency, long lifetime and often a very good beam quality. The most common DPSS lasers use rare-earth doped crystals as the laser gain media, for example, Nd:YAG, Yb:YAG, Nd:YLF, etc.
Nd:YAG laser is probably the most maturely engineered DPSS laser today, for example, a so-called non-planar-ring-oscillator (NPRO) [1] type Nd:YAG lasers are able to produce bandwidth in the kHz range at either 1064 or 1319 nm.
Ti:Sapphire laser is another mature solid state laser that has had long time history of commercializations. Ti:Sapphire is a remarkable laser material with excellent thermo-optic properties. However it cannot be directly pumped by diode lasers; instead it is usually pumped by frequency-doubled Nd:YAG or Nd:YLF lasers.
Below lists emission wavelengths of some solid-state lasers (pumping wavelengths are in parenthesis):
Yb:YAG: 1029 nm (940 nm)*
Nd:YLF: 1047 nm, 1053 nm*
Nd:YAG: 1064 nm, 1319 nm (808 nm or 869 nm [2])*
Nd:YAP: 1080 nm*
Ti:Sapphire: 700-1100 nm (532 nm)
Cr:LiSAF: 780-1060 nm (670 nm)*
Cr:Forsterite: 1130-1367 nm (1064 nm)
Cr:YAG: 1309-1596 nm
Cr:ZnSe: 2138-2760 nm
(*: can be diode-pumped)
Notes and References
[1] It was originally called MISER (monolithic isolated single-mode end-pumped rings). Now everyone is used to the term NPRO. I think it was trademarked by Lightwave Electronics, now a part of JDSU.
[2] Can be upper-state pumped at 869 nm, with lower quantum defect. Upper-state pumping is kind of a resonant Raman pumping, see energy levels of Nd:YAG at http://www.rp-photonics.com/yag_lasers.html.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Reason to start this blog
I am a laserist, I mean, laser physicist, with bad memory. I tend to forget things quickly unless I write things down. So I am starting this blog to write down what I learn and what I think on laser and optics technology. As long as Google server runs, I can always get on internet and retrieve them easily. Hopefully I can keep doing this though.
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