Abstract
There is significant interest in the development of high-average-power diode-pumped lasers for both military and commercial applications. These lasers are used primarily to drive systems using nonlinear optics to generate output wavelengths tram the ultraviolet to the mid infrared. The laser design we discuss has the advantages of modularity, high efficiency, and economy. The economic advantage stems from both the high efficiency of the end-pumped geometry and the use of cw laser diode bars which are the least costly source of diode power. Because the laser head uses cw pumping it can be applied to systems requiring either cw, high-repetition-rate Q-switched, and/or mode-locked output formats. It has been our goal to scale the output power of end-pumped lasers as far as possible while maintaining good beam quality and polarization purity. The laser rod in the 40-W laser is near thermal fracture and, thus, approaches the ultimate scaling limit.
© 1992 Optical Society of America
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