Abstract

Diode-pumped femtosecond laser sources with pulse repetition rate of tens kHz and pulse energies of tens microjoules are of practical importance for diverse materials processing applications. Currently one of the most popular active media for such commercial systems are Yb-doped double tungstate crystals (KGW or KYW). Room-temperature quasi-three-level Yb-doped YVO4 (Yb:YVO₄) laser crystal has attractive spectroscopic properties which makes it promising material for femtosecond laser systems [1, 2]. They have a reasonable large emission cross section (~1.0×10⁻²⁰ cm²), long upper-level lifetime (247 μs), small quantum defect (<5%), and broadband absorption and emission spectra [3]. Here we present the results of experimental study of Yb³⁺:YVO₄ based regenerative amplifier.

© 2015 IEEE