Abstract

We observed experimentally the dynamics of a single-mode CO₂ laser with intracavity saturable absorber (LSA) using a weak probe beam from another CW-operated laser. The LSA laser has only been studied by the detection of its pulsating output intensity, whose time sequences were used to reconstruct the phase space atractors.^1,3 Changing a control parameter of a LSA, like the absorber gas pressure or the cavity tuning, produces cascades of period doubling and type I intermittency with Shil'nikov homoclinic orbits giving routes to chaos. The other dynamical variables of the laser also undergo time change, and their measurement allow the direct determination of the atractors of the laser dynamics.

© 1994 IEEE