First visible 639 nm SrF2:Pr³⁺ ceramic laser

摘要

During the last years the interest for RE doped fluoride ceramics has arisen due to its improved thermo mechanical properties compared to analogous single crystal. Within short period of time number of fluoride nanoceramics were developed and rather efficient diode pumped lasing was demonstrated for LiF:F2⁻ [1], CaF2-SrF2:Yb³⁺ [2], CaF2:Yb³⁺ [3], SrF2:Nd³⁺ [4]. The common feature for all these ceramics was that laser oscillations in near IR spectral region 1–1.2 µm were obtained. It is well known that the optical losses in ceramic host material (scattering on grain boundaries, pores and inclusions) should strongly increase at shorter wavelengths. From this point of view the development and the investigation of laser ceramics which can oscillate at visible wavelengths is of great important. The recent success in visible light generation with Pr³⁺ ions [5] has become possible due to development of efficient blue GaInN diodes. In this work the results on oscillation properties of new Pr³⁺ doped SrF2 ceramics are firstly presented.