Abstract

We investigate theoretically and experimentally the interplay between cavity and double refraction in continuous-wave optical parametric oscillators. We show that basic geometrical effects can prevent transverse wave-vector matching for ${\mathrm{TEM}}_{00}$ modes and thus increase the threshold and dramatically change the beam structures when a resonant (or double-pass) pump is used. We extend the results of Boyd and Kleinman [J. Appl. Phys. 39, 3597 (1968)] to take these cavity-induced mismatches into account and test the theoretical results experimentally, using a continuous-wave type II KTP optical parametric oscillator. The transverse wave-vector mismatch leads to the appearance of transverse modes with increasing order (up to ${\mathrm{TEM}}_{40\hspace{0.5em}0}).$ The theory is able to predict quantitatively all selected transverse modes and admits of a simple interpretation in transverse Fourier space.

© 2002 Optical Society of America

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