Diode-pumped high-efficiency Tm:YAG lasers

Eye-safe solid-state lasers that operate at 2 mm wavelength have many applications in medical, remote sensing and military technologies. With a 3-W CW laser-diode pumping, we obtained 760 mW 2.01 mm Tm:YAG laser under CW operation. The slope efficiency was 44% and the optical to optical efficiency reached 36%. In the acousto-optic Q-switched operation, laser pulses with the energy of 1.2mJ and 380 ns FWHM width have been achieved.