Abstract
It is shown experimentally and theoretically that axial gas flow leads to controlled unidirectional operation of a CO2 ring laser. The direction of emission, clockwise or counterclockwise, can be selected by a slight tuning of the laser cavity (∼1% of the free spectral range). The flow velocity required for complete mode extinction depends on the relative magnitudes of the Doppler and homogeneous line widths and is ∼10 m/sec when the two are comparable.
© 1985 Optical Society of America
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