Sb₂Te₃ as the saturable absorber for the ∼2.0 μm passively Q-switched solid state pulsed laser

We demonstrated a passively Q-switched Tm:YAP solid state pulsed laser based on an Sb₂Te₃ saturable absorber. This saturable absorber was prepared by a facile hydrothermal method. The maximum pulse energy was up to 5.366 μJ at the absorbed pump power of 6.6 W. The corresponding pulse width, output power and repetition rate were 533 ns, 542 mW and 101 kHz, respectively. The results indicated that the hydrothermally synthesized Sb₂Te₃ nanosheet was a promising saturable absorber for near-infrared pulsed lasers.