Practical Solid-State Lasers for Laser Ignition

Diode laser--pumped solid-state lasers.

Diode laser-pumped solid-state lasers are efficient, compact, all solid-state sources of coherent optical radiation. Major advances in solid-state laser technology have historically been preceded by advances in pumping technology. The helical flash lamps used to pump early ruby lasers were superseded by the linear flash lamp and arc lamp now used to pump neodymium-doped yttrium-aluminum-garnet ...

Solid State Lasers for Stereolithography

Stereolithography is a Rapid Prototyping & Manufacturing (RP&M) technique which is used to produce 3 dimensional plastic parts directly out computer files generated by CAD. Stereolithography systems use ultraviolet lasers to solidify liquid resin into the desired form as defined by the CAD file. In recent years, solid state laser technology has reached the point where it can be applied to stere...

Solid-State Lasers

Monolithic solid-state lasers for spaceflight

A new solution for building high power, solid state lasers for space flight is to fabricate the whole laser resonator in a single (monolithic) structure or alternatively to build a contiguous diffusion bonded or welded structure. Monolithic lasers provide numerous advantages for space flight solid-state lasers by minimizing misalignment concerns. The closed cavity is immune to contamination. Th...

Low-heat Solid-state Lasers

The paper discusses the processes that determine the parasitic heat generation and its distribution in the solid-state laser materials. It is inferred that the balance between the laser emission and heat generation is determined by the characteristics of the pumping system and by the partial efficiencies of the various steps of the flow of excitation between the energy levels of the laser mater...