Nd:GdVO4 self-Raman laser using double-end polarised pumping at 880 nm for high power infrared and visible output

Abstract

We report and evaluate a novel double-end polarised 880 nm pumping scheme for a Nd:GdVO4 self-Raman laser, aimed at efficiently generating high output powers in the near-infrared and visible. Compared to conventional single-end pumping, this pump scheme has significant benefits in terms of absorption efficiency, temperature effects in the crystal, and mode-matching between the pumping beam and TEM00 resonator mode. The maximum first-Stokes output powers were 4.1 W for CW operation and 5.63 W for quasi-CW (50 % duty-cycle) operation, with the diode-Stokes conversion efficiency of 11.2 % and 10.3 %, respectively. Visible emission was also realised by intra-cavity frequency-doubling (586.5 nm) or sum-frequency-generation (559 nm) using BBO or LBO crystals. For CW operation, the maximum output power was 3.46 W at 586.5 nm and 4.05 W at 559 nm, with diode-visible conversion efficiency of 10.7 % and 12.5 %; while for quasi-CW operation (50 % duty-cycle), the maximum output peak power was 6.5 W at 586.5 nm and 9.2 W at 559 nm, corresponding to 13.1 % and 18.9 % diode-visible conversion efficiency.