High power and energy generation in a Nd:YAG single-crystal fiber laser at 1834 nm

We report on a diode-end-pumped high-power and high-energy Nd:YAG single-crystal fiber laser at 1834 nm. Two 808 nm diodes injecting about 58Wpump power into the Nd: YAG fiber have generated 3.28Wcontinuous-wave and 1.66 W Cr:ZnSe-based passively Q-switched lasers. Slope efficiencies with respect to pump powers are 8.7% for the continuous-wave laser and 4.9% for the Q-switched laser. The extracted maximum pulse energy is about 266.9 mu J, and the corresponding maximum pulse peak power is 2.54 kW. These performances greatly surpass previous results regarding this specific laser emission because the laser gain medium in the form of fiber can significantly mitigate thermally induced power saturation thanks to its significantly reduced thermal lensing effect. Single-crystal fiber lasers show great potential for high average power, pulse energy, and peak power. (C) 2019 Chinese Laser Press