We present experimental results that show how diode-pumped Tm:YLF can be used to develop the next generation of lasers with high peak and high average power. We demonstrate the production of broad bandwidth, λ≈ 1.9 μm wavelength, high energy pulses with up to 1.6 J output energy and subsequent compression to sub-300 fs duration. This was achieved using a single 8-pass amplifier to boost stretched approximately 50 μJ pulses to the Joule-level. Furthermore, we show the average power capability of this material in a helium gas-cooled amplifier head, achieving a heat removal rate almost ten times higher than the state-of-the-art, surpassing 20 W/cm2. These demonstrations illustrate the capabilities of directly diode-pumped Tm:YLF to support TW to PW-class lasers at kW average power.
The Matter in Extreme Conditions Upgrade (MEC-U) project is a major upgrade to the MEC instrument on the Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) X-ray free electron laser (XFEL) user facility at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. The MEC instrument combines the XFEL with a high-power, short-pulse laser and high energy shock driver laser to produce and study high energy density plasmas and materials found in extreme environments such as the interior of stars and fusion reactors, providing the fundamental understanding needed for applications ranging from astronomy to fusion energy. When completed, this project will significantly increase the power and repetition rate of the MEC high intensity laser system to the petawatt level at up to 10 Hz, increase the energy of the shock-driver laser to the kilojoule level, and expand the capabilities of the MEC instrument to support groundbreaking experiments enabled by the combination of high-power lasers with the world’s brightest X-ray source. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) is developing a directly diode-pumped, 10 Hz repetition rate, 150 J, 150 fs, 1 PW laser system to be installed in the upgraded MEC facility. This laser system is an implementation of LLNL’s Scalable High power Advanced Radiographic Capability (SHARC) concept and is based on chirped pulse amplification in the diode-pumped, gas-cooled slab architecture developed for the Mercury and HAPLS laser systems. The conceptual design and capabilities of this laser system will be presented.
We present experimental demonstrations of the energy density storage and extraction capabilities of Tm:YLF using a table-top diode-pumped system. Here, a Tm:YLF-based oscillator, producing mJ-class pulse energies within both short (nanosecond) and long (millisecond) duration pulses, seeds a single far-field multiplexed power amplifier. The amplifier produced pulse energies up to 21.7 J in 20 ns (>1 GW peak power) using a 4-pass configuration, and 108.3 J in a long duration pulse using a 6-pass configuration. Additionally, the system was reconfigured and operated in a burst mode, amplifying a 6.8 kHz few-ms duration burst of 36 pulses up to 3.6 kW average power. An optical-to-optical efficiency of 19% was achieved during the quasi-steady-state amplification, with an individual pulse fluence over an order of magnitude lower than the saturation fluence.
We present the first demonstration of a multi-joule diode-pumped Tm:YLF amplifier. The compact demonstrator setup, consisting of a Tm:YLF-based oscillator producing ~20mJ, 20ns pulses at 1880nm wavelength that seeds a diode pumped four-pass Tm:YLF power amplifier, generated pulse energies up to 3.9J with a maximum net gain exceeding 200. No saturation effects were observed within this amplifier, as the output pulse energies increased exponentially with the input pump power. When the amplifier was seeded with the free-running oscillator, with pulse durations still significantly shorter than the 15ms radiative lifetime of Tm:YLF, energies of up to 38J were achieved. To the best of our knowledge, this represents over a 100-fold improvement in the highest reported pulse energy from a Tm:YLF amplifier, and nearly an order of magnitude higher energy than any laser operating near 2μm. These results show that Tm:YLF, when operated in an efficient high repetition rate extraction regime and combined with a high-capacity heat removal technique, has the potential to enable a new class of efficient, high peak and average power laser systems to meet the demands of next generation scientific and industrial applications.
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