Abstract

Saturation of near infrared absorption was investigated recently in tetravalent chromium-doped garnets and forsterite.¹ These systems were shown to be effective solid-state saturable absorbers-for neodymium lasers. Using these materials Q-switched and mode-locked laser operations had been obtained. In comparison with traditional saturable absorbers such as dyes in solutions and polymeric films and color-center materials (LiF:F²⁻) these impurity-center crystals exhibit chemical stability, high thermal conductivity, high optical damage threshold, and enable to operate at high repetition rate. Due to these advantages they can find an application in self-mode-locked cw solid-state lasers. In this paper we report on vanadium-doped YAG as a new solid-state passive shutter for near infrared laser systems.

© 1994 IEEE