Shardlow, Peter (Inventors) (2013) METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR LASER PULSE CONTROL.
Abstract
A method and apparatus for controlling the amplification of radiation in a laser gain are described. By using the controlling action of a secondary radiation path through the common gain element the gain, as seen by the primary radiation path, can be controlled or limited. In one particularly set of embodiments pertaining to laser pulse control of a laser cavity, a laser system is described that comprises first and second laser cavities each including a common laser gain medium. The first cavity incorporates a modulation element for variation of its cavity loss. A second cavity is employed that has a substantially distinct path or separable cavity mode from that of the first cavity. The laser threshold of the second cavity is set to a value intermediate to the extremes of the threshold for the first cavity, corresponding to the maximum and minimum loss available to the modulation element. As a result a more flexible control of laser pulsing and laser performance control is provided. Other embodiments of this invention allow improvement of laser performance through the control of the amplification of the output of a laser system through an external laser amplifier by utilising a secondary radiation path through the external amplifier.
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