Generation of Energetic, Picosecond Seed Pulses for CO_2 Laser Using Raman Shifter

摘要

We present a new concept for generating 3 ps seed pulses for a high-power CO_2 laser amplifier that are multiple orders more energetic than seed pulses generated by slicing from a nanosecond CO_2 laser pulse. We propose to send a 1 μm picosecond laser through a C_6D_6 Raman shifter and mix both the pump and shifted components in a DFG crystal to produce pulses at 10.6 μm. Preliminary results of a proof-of-principle experiment are presented.