OPTICAL PARAMETRIC AMPLIFIERS AND OSCILLATORS PUMPED BY TUNABLE LASER SOURCES

摘要

Tunable optical parametric amplifiers (28) and oscillators (30) that are pumped by the light from a tunable laser source (12) are disclosed. One possible embodiment uses a tunable solid-state laser pump (12) and an OPA medium (28) or nonlinear crystal (16), such as potassium titanyl phosphate KTP or barium borate BBO or lithium borate LBO. The second harmonic output from a tunable solid-state laser (12) is also used to pump the OPA medium. A singly or doubly resonant cavity design (30) is preferably used to reduce the oscillation threshold (i.e., the required pump beam power) of the OPO.