Principles and limitations of a quarter-wave plate for reducing the depolarization loss from thermally induced birefringence in Nd:YAG lasers

摘要

Using a Jones-vector formalism, we theoretically and experimentally investigated the principles of a quarter-wave plate for reducing the depolarization loss in a Nd:YAG laser with polarized output. The laser is able to benefit from an extra decrement of the depolarization loss, the maximum value of which is 6.25%.