RF-excited planar CO2 laser with hybrid waveguide-unstable resonator cavities

摘要

A 40 MHz RF discharge excited planar cw CO2 laser with the near diffraction limited output power up to 50 W and the efficiency of 8.5% is studied. Two schemes of the hybrid resonators as positive, as negative branches of the stability diagram are used. The output power and spatial characteristics of the laser beam are studied for both the resonator cavities.