Abstract

As we have shown recently /1/, the efficiency of an optically pumped laser is strongly sensitive to the structure of the atomic (or molecular) levels involved in the amplifying process, in particular to M-degeneracy. Specifically, when the common level b shared by the pump and laser transitions in a typical three-level configuration (Fig.1) has two sublevels m=±1 and the pump and laser fields are both linearly polarized (such as in the case, for instance, of the ammonia farinfrared laser /2/), there is a large difference in the dynamics of the laser when the pump and laser field polarizations are parallel or orthogonal /1,2/.

© 1992 Optical Society of America