Abstract

Optical parametric generation of high-repetition-rate high-energy picosecond mid-IR pulses is demonstrated by use of a Q-switched mode-locked cavity-dumped output-coupled Nd:YAG laser as the pump source for a seeded LiIO₃ optical parametric amplifier. By mixing a high-energy cavity-dumped pulse that is frequency doubled to λ = 532 nm with a dye-laser pulse at λ = 611 nm, we generated 2-μJ, 50-ps pulses at λ = 4.1 μm at a repetition rate of 1 kHz. The application of these IR pulses to nonlinear spectroscopy is demonstrated by measurement of the thermal diffusivity of diamond with IR transient-grating experiments.

© 1993 Optical Society of America

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