A High-Pulse-Energy High-Beam-Quality Tunable Ti:Sapphire Laser Using a Prism-Dispersion Cavity**Supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos 61275157 and 61475040, the National Key Scientific Instrument and Equipment Development Project under Grant No 2012YQ120048, the National Development Project for Major Scientific Research Facility under Grant No ZDYZ2012-2, and the National Key Research and Development Program of China

Abstract

A high-pulse-energy high-beam-quality tunable Ti:sapphire laser pumped by a frequency-doubled Nd:YAG laser is demonstrated. Using a fused-silica prism as the dispersion element, a tuning range of 740–855 nm is obtained. At an incident pump energy of 774 mJ, the maximum output energy of 104 mJ at 790 nm with a pulse width of 100 μs is achieved at a repetition rate of 5 Hz. To the best of our knowledge, it is the highest pulse energy at 790 nm with pulse width of hundred micro-seconds for an all-solid-state laser. The linewidth of output is 0.5 nm, and the beam quality factor M2 is 1.16. The high-pulse-energy high-beam-quality tunable Ti:sapphire laser in the range of 740–855 nm can be used to establish a more accurate and consistent absolute scale of second-order optical-nonlinear coefficients for KBe2BO3F2 measured in a wider wavelength range and to assess Miller’s rule quantitatively.