A major development to improve high power laser chains, is to achieve both higher yields and better tunability. For future high power lasers that operates by diode-pumping at high rate, several materials likely to meet this double requirement (single crystals, glass and ceramics doped) are studied.
Among these materials, calcium fluoride (CaF2) doped by Yb3+ cristals, like those manufactured and studied by the "Materials and Instrumentation Laser (MIL)" group of the CIMAP Laboratory, are one of the most serious candidates. Under its single crystal form and doped with trivalent ytterbium ions (Yb3+), it has remarkable properties: broad absorption and emission bands, high radiative life time, good transition cross-sections and excellent thermo-mechanical properties.
Elmar C. Fuchs1, Brigitte Bitschnau2, Jakob Woisetschläger3, Eugen Maier4, Brigitte Beuneu5 and José Teixeira5
1Wetsus, Center of Excellence for Sustainable Water Technology, Agora 1, 8900 CC Leeuwarden, The Netherlands
2Institute of Physical and Theoretical Chemistry, Graz University of Technology, Rechbauerstraße 12, 8010 Graz, Austria
3Institute of Thermal Turbomachinery and Machine Dynamics, Graz University of Technology, Inffeldgasse 25A, Graz, Austria
4Institute for Chemistry and Technology of Materials, Graz University of Technology, Stremayrgasse 16, 8010 Graz, Austria
5Laboratoire Léon Brillouin, CEA-CNRS/IRAMIS, CEA/Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex, France.