High-efficiency, low-divergence solid-state dye laser source

Summary form only given. High-damage threshold pyrromethene-BF/sub 2/ complex-doped poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) rotating disks provided by PolyOptics Ltd. have been employed to efficiently generate solid dye laser radiation in the 540 to 690 nm range. The laser is pumped by a doubled Q-switched Nd:YAG laser. A compact super-Gaussian unstable resonator has been employed to efficiently extract a large diameter beam, thereby preserving the active medium from too fast degradation while maintaining the highest achievable beam quality. The super-Gaussian mirror was designed to work over the full wavelength range, with a peak reflectivity R/sub 0/=32/spl plusmn/3%, radius w/sub m/=3 mm and super-Gaussianity order n=3-5.