Efficient 750-nm LED-pumped Nd:YAG laser

We report an Nd:YAG laser pumped by light emission diodes (LEDs) at 750 nm. With 1% output coupling from a linear cavity containing a 2-cm long Nd:YAG crystal, the laser generated 37.5 μJ pulse energy at 1064 nm with M² = 1.1 when pumped by 2.73-mJ LED energy in a 1-ms pulse at a 10 Hz rate. The measured optical and slope efficiencies for this linear-cavity laser are 1.36, and 9%, respectively. With 1 and 5% output couplings from a Z-cavity containing the same laser crystal, the lasers generated 346 and 288 μJ pulse energy with an optical efficiency of 3.4 and 2.8% and slope efficiency of 6.6 and 14%, respectively, for the same 1-ms pump pulse repeating at a 10 Hz rate. At the highest output from the Z-cavity, the measured M² for the beam is 3.6.