Loop laser cavities with self-pumped phase-conjugate mirrors in low-gain active media for phase-locked multichannel laser systems

Abstract

It is proved that lasers with different loop cavities with self-pumped phase-conjugate mirrors in low-gain active media can operate under injection of external laser radiation and can be used for the development of diode-pumped phase-locked multichannel neodymium laser systems operating both on the fundamental laser transition with the wavelength λ = 1.06 μm and on the transition with λ = 1.34 μm. The phase-conjugate oscillation thresholds in the case of injection of an external signal are determined for a multiloop cavity configuration and an increased number of active elements in the cavity. It is shown that phase-conjugate oscillation can occur even if the single-pass gain of the active element is as low as only ∼2. Under high-power side diode pumping of a multiloop Nd:YAG laser, single-mode output radiation was achieved at λ = 1.064 μm with a pulse energy up to 0.75 J, a pulse repetition rate up to 25 Hz, an average power up to 18.3 W, and an efficiency up to 20%. In a multiloop Nd:YAG laser with three active elements in the cavity, single-mode radiation at λ = 1.34 μm was obtained with a pulse energy up to 0.96 J, a pulse repetition rate up to 10 Hz, and an average power up to 8.5 W.