Demonstration of stable, long-term operation of a nanosecond pulsed DPSSL at 10 J, 100 Hz
Mariastefania De Vido, Gary Quinn, Danielle Clarke, Luke McHugh, Paul Mason, Jacob Spear, Jodie Smith, Martin Divoký, Jan Pilař, Ondřej Denk, Thomas Butcher, Chris Edwards, Tomáš Mocek, John Collier
Abstract
We report on stable, long-term operation of a diode-pumped solid-state laser (DPSSL) amplifying 15 ns pulses at 1029.5 nm wavelength to 10 J energy at 100 Hz pulse rate, corresponding to 1 kW average power, with 25.4% optical-to-optical efficiency. The laser was operated at this level for over 45 minutes (∼3 · 10 5 shots) in two separate runs with a rms energy stability of 1%. The laser was also operated at 7 J, 100 Hz for 4 hours (1.44 · 10 6 shots) with a rms long-term energy stability of 1% and no need for user intervention. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that long-term reliable amplification of a kW-class high energy nanosecond pulsed DPSSL at 100 Hz has been demonstrated.