New formats for high power / high pulse energy solid state lasers
Experimental activities deal with study and testing of unconventional slab formats for diode pumped solid state lasers (DPSSLs). The experiments carried out have always been complemented by numerical simulations to assess the effects of thermo-mechanical behaviours of the different active media formats, under high pump radiation fluences.This research and development activity is fully integrated with the characterization activity of new laser materials both based on crystal or cermaic hosts. Extemely compact laser sources have been constructed in the recent past with CW output power in the range of hundreds of watts. Our present efforts are in the direction of laser formats suitable for pulsed operation, thus limiting the deletereous effects of Amplified Spontaneous Emission (ASE). Such sources (characterized by a high pulse energy along with high efficiency and average power) turn out to be extremely important for several application fields. These range from laser based space instrumentation to industrial material processing and medical applications.
Different zig-zag slab DPSSL formats
Compact slab Laser prototype (230 W - CW)