Abstract

We have been working on the development of high energy, ultrashort pulse laser systems based on Chirped Pulse Amplification (CPA) in Ti:Sapphire pumped by Nd:YAG and Nd:Glass. These systems begin with the now standard "front end" consisting of a mode-locked Ti:Sapphire oscillator followed by a pulse stretcher, and a regenerative amplifier pumped by a commercially available frequency doubled Nd:YAG. The resulting mJ level pulses are then amplified to several hundred mJ in Ti:Sapphire amplifiers that are also pumped by commercially available Nd:YAG lasers. At this point the pulses can be compressed to the multi-TW level. Systems of this type have become fairly common and even commercially available. However, the pump energy needed to further amplify to energies of several Joules, or even >10 J is beyond what is currently available as a standard commercial product.

© 1997 Optical Society of America