Unidirectional Nd-doped phosphate glass ring laser using the acousto-optic effect in the laser medium

Abstract

Enforcing unidirectional operation of a ring laser using an intracavity travelling-wave acousto-optic (A-O) modulator can be an effective way to achieve both efficient and reliable single frequency operation. Recently, it has been shown that there are two distinct mechanisms which are responsible for the non-reciprocal behaviour of a travelling-wave A-O modulator, and in both cases it has been demonstrated that a sufficient value of loss difference to ensure unidirectional operation can be achieved at very low r.f. powers. This fact suggests that many laser materials, not previously noted as having a high enough figure of merit for many acousto-optic applications, may nevertheless prove to have a more than adequate figure of merit for A-O unidirectional devices.

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