A 60-W high-beam-quality single-oscillator copper vapor laser

We report dramatic improvements (up to four times) in the generation of high-beam-quality (HBQ) output power from copper vapor lasers (CVLs) by using tailored HCl-H/sub 2/-Ne buffer gas mixtures. Up to 60 W of HBQ power was obtained from a 38-mm bore-diameter CVL at a pulse repetition frequency of 12 kHz and 50 W at 22 kHz. This improvement in power capability is attributable to the modification of the spatio-temporal gain characteristics of the laser when using the new buffer gas mixture.