Converting 10-MW nanosecond laser pulses into 5-GW 500 FS tunable dye laser pulses

Abstract

Different ways to produce high-power short laser pulses have been investigated using low-Q short cavity dye lasers and a nanosecond laser pumping. A powerful 500-fs widely tunable ultrashort pulsed laser device is developed using a single standard nanosecond Nd:YAG laser as a pumping source. Two pulse-shortening techniques are combined within this compact and cheap dye laser device. The first technique, called the spectro-temporal selection, is extended to generation of < 100 ps pulses at wavelengths adjustable in the 320-700 nm spectral range. The second technique makes use of an extra- cavity pulse treatment of low-Q dye laser microcavity output pulses by nonlinear resonant processes in dye media to generate single 500-fs pulses. High-power continuously tunable subpicosecond pulses in the 430-850 nm spectral range are produced by supercontinuum generation, spectral selection and amplification in dye amplifiers. Using the pumping pulses from the nanosecond Nd:YAG laser, such a system has achieved 5-GW peal power levels between 50 nm and 670 nm.