Application of pressure scanning to the tuning of a high resolution dye laser

Advantages of pressure scanning over other methods of tuning the wavelength of dye lasers are discussed. The construction of a pressure scanned high resolution dye laser is described. The laser has a scan range of more than 40 cm(-1) in its intermediate resolution mode, an improvement on the order of a hundredfold over previous methods of tuning. Preliminary tests have indicated a scan range of 4 cm(-1) in the high resolution mode. As a demonstration of its applicability and versatility, the laser was used to xesolve the ground state splitting of the chromium isotopes in ruby.