Kinetics of Metastable Argon Optical Excitation and Gain in Ar/He Microplasmas

The optically pumped rare-gas metastable laser is capable of high-intensity lasing on a broad range of near-infrared transitions for excited-state rare gas atoms (Ar*, Kr*, Ne*, Xe*) diluted in flowing He. The lasing action is generated by photoexcitation of the metastable atom to an upper state, followed by collisional energy transfer with He to a neighboring state and lasing back to the metastable state. The metastables are generated in a high-efficiency electric discharge at pressures of ∼0.4 to 1 atm. The diode-pumped rare-gas laser (DPRGL) is a chemically inert analogue to diode-pumped alkali laser (DPAL) systems, with similar optical and power scaling characteristics for high-energy laser applications. We used a continuous-wave linear microplasma array in Ar/He mixtures to produce Ar(1s₅) (Paschen notation) metastables at number densities exceeding 10¹³ cm^-3. The gain medium was optically pumped by both a narrow-line 1 W titanium-sapphire laser and a 30 W diode laser. Tunable diode laser absorption and gain spectroscopy determined Ar(1s₅) number densities and small-signal gains up to ∼2.5 cm^-1. Continuous-wave lasing was observed using the diode pump laser. The results were analyzed with a steady-state kinetics model relating the gain and the Ar(1s₅) number density.