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Solid-state Lasers

Author: the photonics expert (RP)

Acronym: SSL

Definition: lasers based on solid-state gain media (usually ion-doped crystals or glasses)

More general term: lasers

More specific terms: doped insulator lasers, all-solid-state lasers, bulk lasers, fiber lasers, semiconductor lasers

Category: article belongs to category laser devices and laser physics laser devices and laser physics

DOI: 10.61835/qcw   Cite the article: BibTex plain textHTML   Link to this page   LinkedIn

Solid-state lasers are lasers based on solid-state gain media such as crystals or glasses doped with rare earth or transition metal ions. Semiconductor lasers are also solid-state lasers, but they are not always meant with that term.

Ion-doped solid-state lasers (also sometimes called doped insulator lasers) can be made in the form of bulk lasers, fiber lasers, or other types of waveguide lasers.

Solid-state lasers may generate output powers between a few milliwatts and (in high-power versions) many kilowatts.

The first solid-state laser – and in fact the first of all lasers – was a pulsed ruby laser, demonstrated by Maiman in 1960 [1]. Later on, however, other solid-state gain media were preferred because of their superior performance. A major problem with ruby is its pronounced three-level nature.

Optical Pumping

Many solid-state lasers are optically pumped with flash lamps or arc lamps. Such pump sources are relatively cheap and can provide very high powers. However, they lead to a fairly low power efficiency, moderate lifetime, and strong thermal effects such as thermal lensing in the gain medium.

Laser diodes are now most often used for pumping solid-state lasers. Such diode-pumped solid-state lasers (DPSS lasers, also called all-solid-state lasers) have many advantages, in particular a compact setup, long lifetime, and often very good beam quality.

Energy Storage

The laser transitions of rare-earth or transition-metal-doped crystals or glasses are normally weakly allowed transitions, i.e., transitions with very low oscillator strength, which leads to long upper-state lifetimes and consequently to good energy storage, with upper-state lifetimes of microseconds to milliseconds. For example, a laser crystal pumped with 10 W of power and having an upper-state lifetime of 1 ms can store an energy of the order of 10 mJ.

end-pumped laser
side-pumped laser
Figure 1: Typical setups of solid-state bulk lasers, converting pump light (blue) into laser light (red): end-pumped (top) and side-pumped (bottom) versions.

Although energy storage is beneficial for nanosecond pulse generation (see below), it can also lead to unwanted spiking phenomena in continuous-wave lasers, e.g. when the pump source is switched on.

Pulse Generation

The long upper-state lifetimes makes solid-state lasers very suitable for Q switching: the laser crystal can easily store an amount of energy which, when released in the form of a nanosecond light pulse, leads to a peak power which is orders of magnitude above the achievable average power. Bulk lasers can thus easily achieve millijoule pulse energies and megawatt peak powers.

In mode-locked operation, solid-state lasers can generate ultrashort pulses with durations measured in picoseconds or femtoseconds (minimum: ≈ 5 fs, achieved with Ti:sapphire lasers). Some passively mode-locked solid-state lasers have a tendency for Q-switching instabilities, but these can usually be suppressed with suitable measures.

Wavelength Tuning

In terms of their potential for wavelength tuning, different types of solid-state lasers differ considerably. Most rare-earth-doped laser crystals, such as Nd:YAG and Nd:YVO4, have a fairly small gain bandwidth of the order of 1 nm or less, so that tuning is possible only within a rather limited range. On the other hand, tuning ranges of tens of nanometers and more are possible with rare-earth-doped glasses, and particularly with transition-metal-doped crystals such as Ti:sapphire, Cr:LiSAF and Cr:ZnSe (→ vibronic lasers).

Typical Solid-state Lasers

Examples of different types of solid-state lasers are:

More to Learn

Encyclopedia articles:

Bibliography

[1]T. H. Maiman, “Stimulated optical radiation in ruby”, Nature 187, 493 (1960) (first experimental demonstration of a laser); https://doi.org/10.1038/187493a0
[2]R. L. Byer, “Diode laser-pumped solid-state lasers”, Science 239, 742 (1988); https://doi.org/10.1126/science.239.4841.742
[3]G. Huber, C. Kränkel, and K. Petermann, “Solid-state lasers: status and future”, J. Opt. Soc. Am. B 27 (11), B93 (2010); https://doi.org/10.1364/JOSAB.27.000B93
[4]D. C. Hanna and W. A. Clarkson, “A review of diode-pumped lasers”, in Advances in Lasers and Applications (eds. D. M. Finlayson and B. Sinclair), pp. 1–18, Taylor & Francis, New York(1999)
[5]W. Koechner, Solid-State Laser Engineering, 6th edn., Springer, Berlin (2006)
[6]A. Sennaroglu (ed.), Solid-State Lasers and Applications, CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL (2007)
[7]R. Paschotta, Field Guide to Lasers, SPIE Press, Bellingham, WA (2007)
[8]R. Paschotta, “Operation regimes of solid-state lasers”, chapter in Handbook of solid-state lasers: Materials, systems and applications, editors: B. Denker, and E. Shklovsky, Woodhead Publishing (2013), ISBN 0 85709 272 3

(Suggest additional literature!)

Suppliers

The RP Photonics Buyer's Guide contains 134 suppliers for solid-state lasers. Among them:

Megawatt Lasers

solid-state lasers

MegaWatt Lasers Inc. offers CTH:YAG and Er:YAG resonators. These are flash lamp pumped and water cooled. They are optimized for energy and repetition rate. The CTH:YAG resonator is able to generate 4-J pulses at a repetition rate of 10 Hz, while the Er:YAG resonator reaches 3 J at also 10 Hz. Both allow for adjustable pulse widths.

EKSPLA

solid-state lasers

EKSPLA offers a wide range of femtosecond, picosecond and nanosecond lasers as well as tunable wavelength systems for research and industrial applications.

Teem Photonics

solid-state lasers

Lasers from Teem Photonics are all air-cooled diode-pumped solid-state lasers, which are passively Q-switched to generate sub-nanosecond pulses, and in some cases combined with a fiber amplifier. Due to nonlinear frequency converters, available emission wavelengths are 1064 nm, 532 nm, 355 nm, 266 nm and 213 nm.

Stuttgart Instruments

solid-state lasers

The Stuttgart Instruments Primus is an ultrafast (fs) mode-locked oscillator, based on the solid-state technology. It provides a high average output power combined with a superior low noise level (shot noise limit above 300 kHz) and an excellent long-term stability.

The solid-state technology with 1040 nm central wavelength enables the excellent long-term stability by providing several watts of output power at 40 MHz pulse repetition rate and 450 fs pulse duration. Its superior low noise level reaches the shot noise limit above 300 kHz. In combination with the stability and output power, it enables ultrasensitive measurements and makes the Primus perfectly suited as pump source for frequency converters like the Stuttgart Instruments Alpha. The entire system is encapsulated in a solid CNC-cut and water-cooled housing, thus reaching excellent robustness against external perturbations.

Bright Solutions

solid-state lasers

Bright Solutions offers a range of diode-pumped solid-state lasers, including

  • Wedge – nanosecond Q-switched lasers for 266, 355, 532, 1064, 1570, 3100 nm (also multi-wavelength configurations), used e.g. for atmospheric LIDAR, monitoring, glass machining or lithography
  • Onda – compact monolithic nanosecond Q-switched lasers for 266, 355, 532 or 1064 nm, used e.g. for lens marking, plastic marking or intravolume glass marking
  • Sol – compact Q-switched lasers for 355, 532 or 1064 nm, up to 200 kHz, used e.g. for automotive fabrication, electronic machining, ID card writing and other industrial applications
  • Vento – sub-nanosecond MOPA lasers with pulse durations down to 500 ps, up to 200 kHz, up to 100 W average power at 1064 nm or 50 W at 532 nm, e.g. for LIDAR or PCB microprocessing
  • [Aero – high energy lasers ](aero-high-energy-dpss-lasers/) with up to 200 mJ at 1064 nm, 100 mJ at 532 nm, multi-wavelength configurations, custom beam shaping, application e.g. in atmospheric LIDAR, LIBS or nonlinear spectroscopy
  • BDL and BFD – fiber-coupled diode laser modules with up to 200 W cw (or 400 W quasi-cw) in a 200-μm core fiber, e.g. for pumping of solid-state and fiber lasers, material processing or illumination; pulsed models are available
  • NPS – narrowband picosecond lasers for applications like OPO pumping, Raman or fluorescence spectroscopy and multimodal imaging
  • ONE DPSS – miniaturized Q-switched lasers with up to 200 μJ and down to 3 ns, e.g. for atmospheric LIDAR and laser marking on plastics

Radiantis

solid-state lasers

Radiantis broadly tunable lasers are based on solid-state technology. Femtosecond and picosecond pulses as well as continuous-wave (CW) temporal regimes are provided with automatic tuning across the UV, visible and IR.

HÜBNER Photonics

solid-state lasers

HÜBNER Photonics offer diode-pumped solid state lasers in the Cobolt 04-01, 05-01 and 08-01 Series, as well as the Cobolt Skyra and C-WAVE. All our lasers are high performance with excellent wavelength stability and accuracy as well as power stability and very low noise.

Edmund Optics

solid-state lasers

Edmund Optics offers a wide range of diode laser sources, including machine vision lasers, life science lasers, metrology lasers, industrial and point lasers, and material processing lasers.

CNI Laser

solid-state lasers

CNI offers a wide range of all-solid-state lasers not only concerning wavelengths, but also in terms of features, including single frequency lasers, narrow linewidth lasers, low noise lasers, high power and high energy lasers, mode-locked picosecond lasers and Q-switched lasers.

Monocrom

solid-state lasers

Monocrom offers diode-pumped solid state lasers for medical, material processing, LiDAR and spectroscopy applications as well as for laser pumping:

  • LQ-527-12: a frequency-doubled Nd:YLF laser emitting up to 1 mJ at 527 nm
  • Multi-Path 532: a photocoagulation laser emitting up to 8 W cw or 15 W qcw at 532 nm
  • CiOM lasers emitting nanosecond pulses at 526.5 nm

Lumibird

solid-state lasers

Lumibird nanosecond Q-switched Nd:YAG lasers are well known for their ruggedness and versatility. From 5 mJ to 2.3 J at 1064 nm, from single pulse to 400 Hz, they can be diode-pumped (compactness, ease of use) or flashlamp-pumped (high energy), and are available at 532 nm, 355 nm, 266 nm and 1.5 µm. Double pulse models are also proposed for applications in fluid mechanics (PIV).

GWU-Lasertechnik

solid-state lasers

GWU-Lasertechnik provides all-solid-state tunable laser solutions. We have more than 30 years of experience in lasers, non-linear optics and manufacturing. The sophisticated optical and mechanical design of our devices ensure excellent performance, highest reliability and longest lifetime. Our rugged all-solid-state Laser technology does not require any consumable supplies and is thus providing most convenient usability, longest lifetime and excellent total costs of ownership. GWU’s widely tunable laser sources cover the spectral range from the deep-UV at <190 nm to the IR at >2700 nm continuously to serve even most demanding applications in science and industry.

RPMC Lasers

solid-state lasers

RPMC Lasers offers the widest selection of solid-state lasers in North America. From ≈ 1500 standard products to full customization capabilities, we are sure to have what you need: pulsed and CW sources ranging in wavelength from the UV through the LWIR regimes. Pulsed lasers include DPSS lasers, fiber lasers, microlasers/microchip Lasers, ultrafast lasers, and more. Single- & multimode CW DPSS lasers, modules & LD modules are available in both fiber-coupled and free space configurations, as well as gas and fiber lasers, line modules, and many laser diode types, including free space & fiber-coupled diodes, bars & stacks, wavelength stabilized laser diodes, quantum cascade laser diodes, and more! Let RPMC help you find the right laser today!

AMS Technologies

solid-state lasers

Our port­folio of diode-pumped solid state (DPSS) lasers with wavelengths from 213 to 1960 nm includes CW and pulsed systems, frequency-doubled (532 nm) or frequency-tripled (355 nm) models, and Q-switched DPSS lasers:

Frankfurt Laser Company

solid-state lasers

Frankfurt Laser Company offers a wide range of diode-pumped solid state laser products, including the smallest DPSS laser heads, low cost modules, low power and high power laser systems and high quality single longitudinal mode laser systems with different power output and wavelengths.

Questions and Comments from Users

2022-06-24

Could you please explain why most solid state laser can generate pulses shorter than the average lifetime of the excited state.

The author's answer:

The upper-state lifetime is not relevant because it is the lifetime in the absence of light. With a short intense pulse, you can extract the stored energy within a much shorter time.

2022-06-26

In some real solid-state continuous-wave lasers it is possible to observe mode hopping. What is the reason of that?

The author's answer:

See the article on mode hopping.

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