Abstract
To clarify the advantages of Cr:Nd:YAG ceramics rods in solar-pumped lasers, a fused silica light guide with rectangular cross-section is coupled to a compound V-shaped cavity within which a 7 mm diameter 0.1 at.% Cr:1.0 at.% Nd:YAG ceramic rod is uniformly pumped. The highly concentrated solar radiation at the focal spot of a 2 m diameter stationary parabolic mirror is transformed into a uniform pump radiation by the light guide. Efficient pump light absorption is achieved by pumping uniformly the ceramic rod within the V-shaped cavity. Optimum pumping parameters and solar laser output powers are found through ZEMAX© non-sequential ray-tracing and LASCAD© laser cavity analysis codes. 33.6 W continuous-wave laser power is measured, corresponding to 1.32 times enhancement over our previous results with a 4 mm diameter Nd:YAG single-crystal rod. High slope efficiency of 2.6 % is also registered. The solar laser output performances of both the ceramic and the single-crystal rods are finally compared, revealing the relative advantage of the Cr:Nd:YAG rod in conversion efficiency. Low scattering coefficient of 0.0018 cm−1 is deduced for the ceramic rod. Heat load is considered as a key factor affecting the ceramic laser output performance.
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Acknowledgments
This research project (PTDC/FIS/103599/2008) was funded by the Science and Technology Foundation of Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education (FCT-MCTES). Financial support by the Access to Research Infrastructures activity in the seventh Framework Program of the EU (SFERA Grant Agreement no. 228296) is gratefully acknowledged. We would like to express our thanks to Dr. Takashi Ito from Baikowski Japan Co. Ltd. for the helpful discussions about the scattering properties of the 0.1 % Cr:1.0 % Nd:YAG ceramic rod.
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Liang, D., Almeida, J. & Guillot, E. Side-pumped continuous-wave Cr:Nd:YAG ceramic solar laser. Appl. Phys. B 111, 305–311 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00340-013-5334-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00340-013-5334-4