40 kHz, 20 ns acousto-optically Q-switched 4 µm Fe:ZnSe laser pumped by a fluoride fiber laser
Hiyori Uehara, Takanori Tsunai, Han Bingyu, Kenji Goya, Ryo Yasuhara, F. V. Potemkin, Junji Kawanaka, Shigeki Tokita
Abstract
An actively <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"> <mml:mi>Q</mml:mi> </mml:math> -switched mid-infrared Fe:ZnSe laser pumped by a continuous wave fluoride fiber laser has been developed. Stable operation with a pulse duration of 20 ns and a repetition rate of 40 kHz at 4 µm was achieved. The maximum peak power was 1.1 kW. The high-repetition rate, high-peak power nanosecond pulsed laser, which has been created for the first time, to the best of our knowledge, in an actively <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"> <mml:mi>Q</mml:mi> </mml:math> -switched Fe:ZnSe laser, should prove a suitable light source for laser processing and molecular sensing.