Temperature dependence of a diode-pumped cryogenic Er:YAG laser

We report the laser performance of resonantly diode-pumped Er:YAG from liquid nitrogen temperature to above room temperature. Relative to incident pump power, the best performance was observed at approximately 160 K. Spectroscopy and modeling show that this is due primarily to the changing efficiency of diode pump absorption as the absorption lines broaden with temperature. However, the physics of the Er:YAG system indicates that even with arbitrarily narrow pump linewidth the most efficient laser performance should occur at a temperature somewhat above 77 K. The causes of the temperature dependence are at least qualitatively understood.