GB1130457A - Improvements to solid-state laser - Google Patents

Abstract

1,130,457. Lasers. INTERNATIONAL STANDARD ELECTRIC CORP. 26 May, 1966 [26 May, 1965], No. 23630/66. Heading HIC. A laser device includes a body 14 of active material contained in a first compartment B of a housing, the laser radiation path passing through one or more further compartments A, C which are separated from the first so that turbulence in fluid contained in the first compartment has little effect on fluid in the other compartments. A fluid, e.g. water, having a refractive index close to that of the material of flash tube 15 and also close to that of the active medium, e.g. ruby, is introduced at 18 to cool reflector 19, flash tube 15 and ruby rod 14. Bulkheads 6, 7 prevent turbulence being transmitted between the compartments, which are, however, in communication through drain ducts 21 to 24. The laser resonator mirrors are mounted in end walls 8, 9, and the refractive index of the coolant also preferably approximates to that of the mirrors. An antimist device 29 is provided at the output end and consists of a glass tube closed by a Brewster window 30. In a second embodiment the single ruby rod is replaced by three separate rods, each with its own flash tube and cylindrical reflector, the rods being longitudinally aligned and spaced apart by sleeves which prevent the coolant fluid surrounding the rods from circulating between the rods. The optical absorption characteristics of the coolant in compartment B may be matched to the desired pumping frequency for the laser body and it may contain fluorescent material. A different fluid may be circulated in compartments A and C if the compartments are sealed one from another, and in the second embodiment the second fluid may also be circulated inside the sleeves between the laser rods.