Abstract

Unidirectional ring lasers are commonly used to eliminate spatial hole-burning in the gain medium and hence allow single-axiaimode operation of the laser. A number of applications require two (or more) laser outputs, each of which comprises a single frequency, i.e., not accompanied by adjacent modes, and which are stable in frequency and amplitude. Here we report a technique for achieving this, either cw or Q-switched, in a unidirectional ring laser. The technique is based on the presence of a small degree of beam overlap in the gain region of the laser.

© 1993 Optical Society of America