Fifteen Years of Work on Thin-Disk Lasers: Results and Scaling Laws

Abstract

The principal ideas of the thin-disk laser design will be illustrated and the advantages for operating different laser materials will be explained. The results for continuous-wave (CW) and Q-switched operation as well as for amplification of short (nanosecond) and ultrashort (picosecond, femtosecond) pulses demonstrate the potential of the thin-disk laser design. The scaling laws for this laser design show that the power limit for CW operation is far beyond 40 kW for one single disk and the energy limit is higher than 3 J from one disk in pulsed operation. Also, the applicability of the thin-disk laser concept to optically pumped semiconductor structures will be discussed. When pumping directly into the quantum wells, the energy defect between the pump photon and the laser photon can be smaller than 5%, thus reducing the waste heat generated inside the semiconductor structure. First results demonstrate the potential of this new concept. Finally, a short overview of the industrial realization of the thin-disk laser technology will be given.