Thermal loading in highly efficient diode pumped ytterbium doped lithium niobate lasers

LiNbO/sub 3/ is an attractive and widely used dielectric medium in integrated optics. An optimisation of the laser action performance from a diode-pumped Yb/sup 3+/ doped LiNbO/sub 3/:MgO crystal has been carried out. The results are compared to those obtained under the same experimental conditions on Nd doped LiNbO/sub 3/ crystals. It is concluded that thermal loading is higher in Nd:LiNbO/sub 3/ mainly because of the larger quantum defect between pump and laser photons.