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Q: Fachverband Quantenoptik und Photonik

Q 22: Laser development: Solid state lasers I

Q 22.3: Vortrag

Dienstag, 19. März 2013, 11:30–11:45, F 142

Diode-Pumped Broad-Band Joule-Class Yb:CaF₂ Laser Amplifiers — •Joachim Hein^1,2, Jörg Körner^2,3, Diethard Klöpfel², Reinhard Seifert¹, Hartmut Liebetrau², Martin Kahle¹, Thomas Töpfer^3,4, and Malte Kaluza^1,2 — ¹Helmholtz-Institut Jena, Fröbelstieg 3, 07743 Jena — ²Institut für Optik und Quantenelektronik, FSU Jena, Max-Wien-Platz 1, 07743 Jena — ³Lastronics GmbH, Winzerlaer Straße 2, 07745 Jena — ⁴Hellma Materials GmbH, Moritz-von-Rohr-Straße 1, 07745 Jena

We report on the development of a burst mode laser system based on the active material Yb:CaF₂. Despite the advantageous characteristics of this material for diode-pumped femtosecond pulse amplification the low achievable gain requires a high energy density of the extraction beam, a well homogenized pump radiation, many extraction passes, and preferably low temperatures of the gain material. This is solved by a novel multipass architecture, energy extraction by a burst of pulses instead of a single pulse, and cryogenic cooling with liquid nitrogen. Laser simulation and the analysis of a couple of multipass schemes are presented. Starting with nJ pulses from a femtosecond oscillator a chain of three amplifiers boosts the energy of a burst of 50-500 pulses to the Joule level. Amplifiers are operated by pumping with laser diodes of 20 kW peak power at 10 Hz. This burst pulse structure is suitable for several experiments for instance in combination with pulsed accelerators. Nowadays Yb:CaF₂ crystals can be produced at very large sizes and high optical quality. Based on the reported schemes even larger laser systems that enter the kJ range are imaginable.