Method to produce a short pulse on rf discharge excitation slab-type carbon dioxide laser

Abstract

We propose a novel system to produce the short pulse using a halved confocal of the unstable concave-convex resonator on radio frequency discharge excitation slab type carbon dioxide laser. This method is provided a full reflection concave mirror to have a function of variable curvature which can control using a piezo electric device (PZT). Generally, the slab type laser is directly modulated by applying pulse voltage for pulsation of laser. There is a large capacity and fluctuation of plasma at the transition of pulsation. Consequently, the pulse width is longer than 1.0 micro second and repetitive frequency is less than 10 kilo Hertz. On the other hand, the pulse oscillation by our proposed method has the short pulse width which is 300 nano second and maximum repetitive frequency is about 100 kilo Hertz. We can choose the pulse oscillation or the continuous wave (CW) oscillation at the each condition on same resonator. The peak power at the pulse oscillation is about 12 times as high as that at the CW oscillation.