ties N, and J) in those levels. je ceiUM— Cau /en Nie 'y af the beam (power per unit area) as it enters the im and J represents the intensity at some distance z into the medium, Itcan ‘be seen from (7.33) that if the value of the exponent is positive, the beam will in- Grease in intensity and so amplification will occur. If it is negative, the beam will Gecrease in intensity and absorption will occur. Since the values of o,; and < always positive, we can see immediately that amplification will occur only Nei ttl Bra sufficient condition, We will now address the requirements “The subject of how to produce cents inversions will be exp!7.3 SATURATION INTENSITY (SUFFICIENT CONDITION - FOR A LASER) S Equation (7.33) suggests the possibility of rapid growth of a beam qhrough a medium of length z if the exponential coefficient is positive: ficient magnitude. We will next determine the requirements for the 1 that coefficient for various physi ‘ies that might be considered sible laser configurations. Befor: © must consider the €ffect of Satura— — tion of the laser beam as it grow: ly within a gain medium: Assame thereis a medium (su of Figure 7-1) in which a population: nversion exists,-and assume that the ‘of the gain — the exponent of 33) — -farge enough to provide significant amplification of the beam. If we- se the length of the medium to allow the intensity F to increase ex] Mia stimulated emission), (7,33) suggests that the beam could eventually{at some specific length z) such that the energy stored in the upper level is not sufficient to satisfy the exponential growth demands of the beam. thete must be a limiting expression to estimate the intensity at which this jaturation process occurs. If we consider what happens on a microscopic scale as the beam transits the medium, we will be able to derive a simple relationship that Provides the intensity at which the beam stops growing exponentially. The length 2 of the medium at which that saturation effect occurs can be expressed as the sat- uration length L... From our previous analysis, we can anticipate that the specific Tength £44 would be associated with the specific value of the product o4ANy for a given medium. The intensity achieved by the beam when z = Lise will be re- ferred to as the saturation intensity, I.a., in units of Power per unit area or energy et unit time pet unit area. We will perform a simple calculation to estimate [.a by considering levels « in acase where a steady-state population density Ni, exists in the upper level. assuming that a population inversion exists between levels u and tf, so we jurmise that the steady. State is not one of thermal equilibrium. We will assume, dicated in Figure 7-5, that there is a pumping flux R, (number of excitations mit volume per unit time) that is populating level « (which has a lifetime r,) nd Would therefore normally decay at arate of | /T. We also assume that the pop- Hation in level u can be reduced by stimulated emission resulting from a beam of tensity 7(\)) and frequency 1 transiting the- medium such that AE hve Pa RAISIN eee a cory: een noeship u(v) = I ite wave '(v)/c to relate the energy density iH We have assumed that level w is in a steady-state equilibrium, so we ¢ } fate equation taking into account all of the population changes affecting and equate it to zero, since “steady state” implies that there are no net cl } N,. This equation can be expressed as aN, _ 1), Baw) | Gene) ii} ‘This analysis is carried out for the case where homogeneous broadening domi | nates. For Doppler broadening, the beam would interact with any subset of atoms — traveling in ny specific direction and over a frequency width equal to the width of the beam, which could be the equivalent of one or more natural linewidths of the — “system. The same conclusion would be reached in this situation. Equation (7.36) i suggests that the steady-state solution for N, is = Ne = Bese : (7.37) 1 Byv). L =z c When / = 0, the value of the population density Nis given 3s N= Ratei ene I oe for many different found that they vary over many orders of magnitude. For upper laser levels of n _ visible laser levels, the values of r, range from 10-? to 10- s. We can examine (7.37) and see that as / increases (according to eqn. 7.33) as the beam traverses _ Tong gain medium, a value of z (z= Lu) would eventually be reached such that the intensity 7, and consequently the stimulated emission term in the denomina- tor of that equation, could eventually become as large as the term associated with _ the level lifetime. Since the value of 1/1, can be quite large (ranging from 107/s to ~ 10°%/s), a significant intensity / would be required for that to happen. We will de- ~ fine that intensity as I... When saturation occurs, the population of level « would decrease by a factor of 2 to a value of R,.t,/2 owing to stimulated emission. Ae “cording to (7.37), the exponential growth factor 04:(v) AN, rz of (7.33) for z the gain) would also decrease by approximately a factor of 2 because Ny wa "decrease by 2. Further increase in J would further decrease the gain im regions = where the beam propagates further into the medium, as suggested by (7.37). Thus, | for our analysis we will arbitrarily define J... as that intensity at which the stimu= lated rate downward equals the normal radiative decay rate: hanBulv)c Hii ~ Bane. I it ii ae relationship of (6.55) between B,,(v) and Au(v), te : Sen vi Avan CAw(v) ty : HUN for o/f(v) of (7.13), we can write oto, ; For situations in which the stimulating beam has a %, (Atp < t,), the saturation ene: | fived later in Section 8.6 is pulse duration Ary melee Fax (enerpy per74 DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH OF A LASER BEAM Growth of Beam for a Gain Medium with Homogeneous Broadening We now have a formula for the intensity /4. above which the laser beam can no longer grow exponentially according to (7,33). It would be useful to obtain a value of the gain or the exponent of (7,33), ow(v)A Nui, at which the beam would reach the saturation intensity. We will consider a beam that starts by spontancous emis- sion and is subsequently amplified over a frequency width approximately equal to the homogeneous linewidth Av” centered at the center of the emission frequency vui- We will not be able to derive an exact value of the gain required to reach Ly roximate thal can be applied to every situation. We will, however, obtain any range of values that are dependent on the length and width of the gain medium. Consider a cylindrical gain medium, as shown in Figure 7-6, that has a length L, a cross-sectional area A, and a diameter d,. Within that gain medium we as- Assume that the upper laser level w is sume that a population inversion exists, insiantancously populated by some form of pumping process to achieve a densit Nu. and suppose that the radiative decay rate from level u to level J at frequency Approximation, we will assume that Mut is Au). Because this calculation is only unan upper limit on the gain exponent, o//(v)ANuL. “r simplicity we will consider the beam as starting at one end of the: 1 a of length fg, as shown in Figure 7-6. We define fy as one gain length Such that o,f()A Nyilp = 0.) (v) Nuly = 1; implicit in this definition is that I, <_ £, We will assume that the atoms in level u within that region are radiating at a fate Aui and with an energy per photon of hv,:. Some of these photons are emit- ted in the elongated direction of the amplifier and would therefore be enhanced by stimulated emission as they transit through the length L of the medium. Thus, ty 4 beam would evolve as the radiation propagates down the length of the medium and the intensity grows exponentially. We will calculate the conditions required for the beam to reach the saturation intensity When it arrives atthe opposite end of the amplifier. Of course, a similar situation would also happen at the other end of the medium for a beam traveling in the opposite direction; the calculation would be the same for both directions. We could also consider atoms in the next volume element fo the right of the region of length /., but the beam initiated by such a vol- ume element would not quite reach the saturation intensity since it would not have. 5 raversed as much length as the beam originating from the end region. ‘We Will therefore consider this calculation as an approximation by neglecting effeets from: other volume elements to keep it simple, ‘The result, in fact, provides a reasonably. 800d approximation even when compared to that of a more rigorous calcul ion, We thus consider the energy radiated per unit time into.a-4ar solid angle from within the volume A «1, as N,(A <1.) A, shia, This is multiplied by the fractionalportion of the energy radiating within a solid angle d@ that would reach the op- posite end of the medium: d&/47. This fraction of the total solid angle can be ‘expressed as (A/L?)(1/4x), or simply A/47L”. We assume that the energy tadi- ated from that volume element per unit time is amplified by an amount equal to e72()%L by the time it reaches the other end of the medium. We divide that energy per unit time by the area A to obtain an intensity. We then equate that intensity 1 the saturation intensity T,.. This entire process is described as follows: shen (Me Ah Auho ia ‘axl? A oy ohW)t. For the simplest case — where the only decay process from level u is via radiative decay to level / — we can express the decay time as t, = 1/Aur, so that (7.43) can be rewritten as vg A (Na: A= IgAuly, ~a (1.44) oo) which reduces to x a i ) | oaingeaes 745). f HAN, ) 4mke olay j where the area A has been rewritten as A = 77(d,/2)° and /, has been replaced by: 1/o}!(v)N,. Recall that we use L, to denote the length at which the beam reaches the saturation intensity. Further simplification then leads toPHO 161 fd) @quation can be expressed more simply as eo = (Laid), = CHWIN Lee = OWA Ni Lea. ‘Choosing a length /,-leads to a sim- result. Tf a very much shorter region than f, were chosen then & Significant Of the energy that might eventually be amplified would be left out of the n.téa significantly longer Tegion than 1, were chosen. a much shorter atial-growth length than 1.4 would have to be used and the beam would-no much energy through amplification, ‘However, minor change iS significantly: A Problem at the end of this chapter considers-a ahd, {the diameter of the amplifier) rather than f,, and 1 OWE be seen dength change for the initial tactiating region does not make a Signific; in the final result, that is, in the amount OF gain required:te-reaehs A will be referred 1 as the threshold pain and will be‘indicane, coefficient as ¢y,, |fhe solution to (7.47) can be graphed in the form of either Lay/dy versus Da/dg versus off ANuiLu, a8 shown in Figure 7-7. This graph has several i "cations, First: The ratio of the length of the amplifier to its diameteris an important — factor in how much gain is needed to reach saturation. In most cases, itis difficult — _ to generute a large gain factor (such as gli = O40) Nw sa: = 12) in an ample _ fying medium of any reasonable length. One might therefore think it simpler to use — _ Snamplifier with a low value of Lsx/da, since according to Figure 7-7 that ampli- _ fier would require less gain; however, such reasoning turns out to be erroneous. — _ Let us consider two extreme situations that will clarify this issue. = We will consider two differently shaped gain media, as shown in Figure 7-8. One is a long cylinder, similar to that of Figure 7-6; the other is a sphere of di ‘tmneter d.,. For the long cylinder, say L,u/d, = 100, spontaneous emission will _ ‘eriginate at onc end of the medium and will emerge at the other end in an efongated ‘shape, as shown by the dashed fines exiting from the cylinder. This could certainly _ beconsidered a beam. We can see from Figure 7-7 that the value of o7(v)Ni.E ay ‘be approximately 12 and thus the beam would have grown by an amount = 1.6 x 10°! This is an extremely large increase resulting in-a very intense ‘with an extremely low divergence, hee Now consider the case of the sphere,-where La,/d; = I-For this case the of (7.47) is not completely accurate, but some conclusions can nevertheles be drawn from the simplified analysis, First, Figure 7-7 suggests that the value. WGN, L xx 38 approximately 2.7 for Lu:/dy = 1, This would represent an growth factor of 627 = 15, which is significantly lower than the val1.6 x 10° obtained for the elongated medium. While such a “laser” would ‘be just intense at the surface of the Sphere as that from the elongated medium (since: too; would reach 7,..), the intensity would be rapidly reduced as one moves away the sphere. In other words, the radiation originating from different locations within the sphere would cause the beam to diverge rapidly (rather than remain con- ratedin a Specific direction) in the same manner as Tadiation emitting from a spherically shaped incoherent source. Second=The radiation emitted from the ‘entire sphere will be emitted equally =i all-directions, since the sphere is completely symmetrical. Therefore. given a #iain population density NV, in level w within the medium, the Maximem amount fenerzy-E,; that could be radiated on that transition from u to £ Eg ithin-a time of 1/A,,;, where V fepresents the volume of the sphere. same-amount that would be radiated by spontancous emissi : Because E,, represents all af the energy stored in level a there is no additional cnergy available to be radiated by stimifiated the same amount of energy would merge trom the sphere unde: ain as would occur with no gainiin the Hedin! This means th “thedium, the only effec caused by the existence of ti7.5 EXPONENTIAL GROWTH FACTOR (GAIN) Ie 4s appropriate at this time tolexamine the various components of the gain in order to understand the important factors associated with producing a gain of 12. From the analysis we will see that mirrors are required to enable most Javers to reach Soe STIMULATED EMISSION CROSS SECTION If we look al the stimulated exnission cross section g,;, as summarized by the formulas in Table 7-1, we can see that none of the coefficients can be easily adjusted, The transition probability is fized for a given laser transition. We could make the wavelength longer, since 04, depends upon the square of the wavelength, but we may need a laser to be at a specific wave. length — ruling out any such adjustments. We could try to reduce the linewidth For Doppler broadening this would involve reducing the temperature, linewidth depends upon the square root of the temperature, this is not a very senss tive factor. In other words, there is. generally not much we can do abo ng ‘he stimulated emission cross section; we must think of it as a constant fora specifi ‘aser transition in a specific gain medium. ‘Typical value but since the uit ner 8 Of Gy for various laserLA DIFFERENCE The second component of gain is the popal ference factor AN,:. or [Ny — (gu/gi) Ni]. There are two important aspects of this function, One is the requirement that N, be greater than (g,,/gi)!V;. Satisfying this requirement will be addressed in Chapter 9, when we talk about the types of level _ systems that can be used to develop population inversions. Making N, greater than N; generally is determined by the populating and decay rates of both the upper and — lower laser levels during the excitation process. The second important aspect is the necessity for a relatively large population density difference AN,;. Since the gain must be of the order of 12, and since a4; is “ypically of the order of 10" m2, it would be desirable to have the population den- sity difference be of the order of 12 /oy1, or in this case approximately 1.210" m~? for a laser with 1 = 1 m. Such a density is not easy to achieve. This issue will be addressed in more detail in Chapter 10, when we deal with excitation mechanist. _ GAIN LENGTH We now examine the third component of gain: requirements of the Jength L of the gain medium. Lasers have been made with gain media leagths ‘ranging from less than | millimeter to longer than 10 meters. Long lasers, for the ‘most part, have not turned out to be very useful (except in some special eases, such “@ the high-power NIF laser at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories). Long Tasers are to cumbersome, too diflicult to set up and operane, and hence Hk Vey practical. People using lasers naturally prefer £ to be as small as possible | er. this requirement sometimes creates problems, Tn many cases there are limitations on maki1-10, the stimulated emission cross sec- "and AN,, is of the order of 5 x 16° m—_ available to overcome this limitation. That technique is the useof fectively increase the length of the medium.7.6 THRESHOLD REQUIREMENTS FOR A LASER Most lasers have limitations on the population density that can be achieved in any particular energy level, which in turn places limits on the maximum AW, that can be obtained for a specific laser transition. Also, the stimulated emission cross section is essentially a constant for a specific laser transition. Therefore, the only factor of the gain that can be increased is the effective length of the amplifier, since it is not practical to make long lasers, This increased effective length can be real- ized with the use of mirrors. We will determine the threshold gain requirements for producing a laser with no mirrors as well as with cither one or two mirrors lo- cated at the ends of the gain medium. The threshold gain conditions are defined as. the necessary requirements for the beum to grow to the point at which it reaches Saturation intensity / Ju. with No Mirrors i sider an amplifier similar 1 that showo in Figure 7:6, A diagram is shown in Figure 7- Hie Anne with can. ite of the beam_ CONDITIONS FOR PRODUCING A LASER: io would emerge if the length L were sufficient for the beam to reach Jy at the end ____ of the amplifier. The beam would then meet the threshold gain requirement that = Bm Ls = Out ANut Low = 12 5. (755) } ar gain coefficient of 60 m~! at the center of the emission pro- file and an amplifier length of 0.2 m. For what diameter d, of the gain medium would the saturation intensity be reached in a single pass through the amplifier? = What would be the divergence half-angle of the beam exiting from the medium? (See Figure 7-11(a).) Since g = 60m ‘and L = 0.2m, we have an exponential growth factor (gain) ‘of 60: x 0.2 m = 12, Thus, spontaneous emission originating from the end of the amplifier would grow accordi = = (1.63 x 10°STo- Using (47 ‘we can determine that, fora gain of 12, Lor /da = hhalf-angle of the emerging beam would have an angular divergence determined Py since spontanequs en ysion on "any radial position at the end of the ampli end of the amplifier) that would reach the saturation he Amplified as they traveled the enuire length & 9‘were not sufficient to reach saturation, we could add a mirror , amplifier as shown in Figure 7-11(b). Adding a mirror can be thought adding a second amplifier behind the first one, as shown in the figure, since — mirror effectively produces an image of the existing amplifier located behind that amplifier. For this simplified discussion, we assume that the mirror reflectiv- is 100% at the laser wavelength and that the mirror is placed directly behind the — amplifier. In this case, we can again indicate the beam envelope that would occur, assuming that the beam just reaches J, after two passes through the amplifier. ean see that the beam is narrower, as it emerges from the end of the amplifier, =—— ‘ompared to the case with no mirrors shown in Figure 7-11(a). For this ar- —tangement involying one mirror, the gain medium would meet the threshold gain — requirement if a Sisbce = fn (2L) = tANuOL) = 12 £5. (756) | Lex = 21, and here we have referred to this length as the effective dengsth or Ley.amplifier with a length of 0.12 m and a gain coefficient of 60 m~ has a 100% feflecting mirror at the laser wayelength coated on one end of the laser rod. _ For a rod diameter of 5 mm, what would be the half-angle of the diverging beam __ ¢xiting from the amplifier? (See Figure 7-11(b).) Would the beam reach the satu- _ tation intensity as it emerges from the rod after having made a double pass through the rod? —_ With one mirror on the end of the rod, this laser has an effective saturation ~Tength Lez = 2L, as shown in Figure 7-11(b). Thus the eflective L /d, ratio for this laseris L¢/d_ = (2 x 0.12 m)/(0.005 m) = 48. The half-angle would be de- sermined by the factor d,/2L = (0.005 m)/2(0.12 m) = 2.1 x 10~? rad (21 mrad). Equation (7.47) can be expressed as = 16(Lerr/da)* = 16{(2 x 0.12 m)/(0.005 my}? = 16(48)* = 3.7 x 10", = eve)L og = g(vo)2L. The beam would thus reach the saturation{sa- foran amplifier length of £ = x/2g(vo). Wecan solve for t in the equation af Mayed to find that x = 10.5 and L. 2e = 10.4/2(60) m7 = 0087 a the rod had not been coated (i.e., no mirror) then the beni Would have grown by: factor of only €°* = 191 15 it mad single passthrough the smplifieg and dhs1 the amplifi¢r, We could add a second mirror in front of the amplifier. We flow a slight amount of light to “leak” out of the end by using a mirror with ly 99.9% reflectivity, so that a portion of the beam can escape and provide an rvable signal. Placing a mirror at each end of the amplifier effectively adds infinite series of amplifiers behind the original amplifier, as shown in Figure Hic); ae essentially allows the amplifier to have as much length as necessary a, provided that the mirror reflectivities are sufficiently high (as will be inthe following section). For such an arrangement, the beam emerges marrow: angular divergence. This results in a very low-divergence laser therefore the arrangement sed ‘for most lasers. The details of such fa= surrounding an amplifier. However, the analysis here provides a simple visualiza- how a low-divergence beam evolves. hwo factors determine if a two-mirror laser can reach J... st be @ net gain per round trip of the beam: | all of the losses (including transmission losses) must be lower than the gain or nt, must ast long ‘engul through the amplifier iiatisfied as follows. Consider a round- pass of the beam through the amplifier, and assume that the gain is uniform rer the amplifier fength (not changing jn time). In this case the beam will experi- ‘ence an exponential growth of e#(")?/ for a round trip through the amplifier. It will -also experience a loss at each mirror of | ~ Ry where & is the mirror reflectivity. ace the beam will be reduced by the factor R after it is reflected from each mir- The minimum round-trip steady-state requirement for the threshold of lasing that the gain exactly equal the loss, In this case the beam will remain unchanged it makes one round trip through the medium. Thus, any increase in gain be- the threshold will cause the beam to grow. For the simple situation in which mirrors have ihe same feflectivity R, this threshold can be expressed as SIMPLE CASE Requirement (1) can be Si eat sD Ae fa op In re (258) S i& GENERAL CASE A more general situation would be one in which the mirrors: have different reflectivities R; and R2. We will allow for fractional losses ay and a> at the “Brewster windows” (see Section 11.2) or at any other region in the path ‘of the beam other than inside the amplifier. and we also include a possible distrib- — uted loss @ within the gain medium; o does not involve the particular laser levels :and | but occurs at the same frequency as that of the laser beam. For this general “jtuation, the threshold equation for a round-trip pass becomes RR i (am—e)2E (7.59) ‘The solution for the thres!3 é 1 See a MUN a ae oa coefficient go must be greater than g,, for “which the amount of gain just equals: ‘ase above that value in order for a —CIENT GAIN DURATION Requirement (2) concerns the minimum gain dura- 4, for the beam to reach /,u., and this value can be obtained by using the term — ‘m to describe the number of passes through the amplifier before /.. is reached. “Thus, the effective gain length becomes mL. The threshold condition for produe- a laser can then be given as enmL = 12, 65 we have taken an average value of the gain in (7.48). An expression for mz then-be obtained as = Rink (7.62) mirror feficctivity_ is significantly less than 100%, the analysis becomes more and will not be carried oul here. We will therefore consider (7.62 }as ig-a Minimum number of passes to reach the saturation intensity sledge of m can be used (o determine s,.. We will use a hier minorsepe= 2 ssuchthatd = L. For this general situation. the time £15 Simply distance oma * veloeiny) very“Knowledge of m can be used (0 determine t,. We will use a laser mirror sepa- fon d such that d > L. For this general situation, the time , is simply (7.63) — The velocity of light is here c/y, where ¢ is the velocity of light in a vacuum and “is the index of refraction of the medium in which the developing beam travels. king into account the possible difference in refractive index for the beam when is within the gain medium versus when it is between the gain medium and the “gnirrors, we can express (7.63) in a more general form as =mincld —L)+ mL ic, (2.64) js the index of refraction of the medium inside the cavity between the but outside of the Taser amplifier (which is usually air, nc = 1). d — Lis “between the mirrors that does not include the amplifil’< andy, 1s the — sefraction within the laser gain medium,Knowledge of m can be used to determine 4, We will use a laser mirror sepa- Tation d such that d > 1. For this general Situation, the time 2, is simply | distance md as yelocity c/n __ The velocity of light is here c/y, where cis the velocity of-light ina vacuum and nis the index of refraction of the medium in which the developing beam travels. ~ Taking into account the possible difference in refractive index for the beam when “itis within the gain-medium versus when it is between the gain medium and the S mirrors, we Can express (7.63) ina More general form as a6) Ze MM LY tng LV e, where Ne is the index of refraction of the medium inside the cavity between the — TOFS but outside of the laser amplifier (which is Nsually site eg = Gistance between the mirrors that oes not include the amplif; ee e $ the ampli and- is the index of refraction within the laser gain medium. ee — z9.2 RELATIVE DECAY RATES — RADIATIVE VERSUS COLLISIONAL Before we analyze level systems that allow population inversions to develop, it i useful to review some properties of both radiative decay (spontaneous emission} and = 1/AE;), the relationship between ky and A into account eqn. 9.4) is given by ky AA Ege. From this we can see that the collisional rate downward from level proportional to the energy separation AE,; between level « and this relationship was obtained for electron collisions with gas verse relationship holds for solids as well. : We can therefore draw 4 dizcram Colpanne ieee9.3 STEADY-STATE INVERSIONS IN THREE- AND FOUR-LEVEL SYSTEMS es ‘We now consider two types of three-level systems and also a general four-level sys— _tem, a8 diagrammed in Figure 9-3. that can provide steady-state population inver- sionsiic. WV, > (g.,/2:)N:)- Steady-state conditions are those in which the pump- ing flux is constant and the populations are not changing with time, even though there is population moving in and out of the relevant levels. We will derive expres- sions-for the ratio N,,/N; to determine where a population inversion ts obtained_inree-Level Laser with the Intermediate Level as the Upper Laser For the traditional three-level arrangement shown in Figure 9-4, we have i,u,! with populations Ni,N,,.Ny and B; > E, > E;. We assume that the transition occurs from level/w to level ! (in this case the ground state). We als: po assume that the gain medium is in thermal equilibrium before we begin pumping — from level ! to level i at a rate 1. In such a situation we have decay from level 7 to level u at a rate yi, decay from level i to level J at a rate yi), and decay from the upper laser level u to the lower laser level } at a rate Yut, Which can be made up — of both the radiative decay rate and a collisional decay rate. Solid-state laser mas terials are specifically chosen to have decay for level uw be predominantly radiative and so A,, is the dominant decay rate from level u. We assume no thermalizing excitation from the ground-state level ! to levels u and i, since we assume that the energies of u and i are sufficiently high that such Processes are very small. This can be shown by using the principle of detailed balance, in which Naval Nivow (9.6) for the conditions of thermal equilibrium as described in Chapter 6. Using the Boltzmann relationship N,/N) <= e847 and again assuming g,, = gy, we haveaN dt dN, ee aa = oy Nu + YuN i dni A = Tae PWN ie vane =O: dt them to zero, We use IT 10, it an Saini aaligd' pumping or excilat and y to describe an excitation oF decay process inherently a: ) medium. We have neglected y;,,., Vii. And y@ because of the imp! and because the energy Separations are much ercater than RE, We Summed that ho significant extemal purping process becur: \ SUS pe OE Kiser,| population inversion can occur, Wig investigate the ratio N,/Ni (assuming that gy ~ gi) such that = | es Ni Yuu + Yat) we would thus have a population inversion if Ty > a(! + ui) ae We can see that it is desirable to have the ratio yiz/'Y be as small as ‘order to minimize the requirements on the pumping rate Py, Inf ‘ease for most solid-state lasers, since collisional depopulationiser, if the pumping rate F ss lar then the popuilation will be transfered to leve By rapid collisional decay, which eventually produces an inversion and level /. Thus, for extremely high pumping Fates, most of the | side in level u and thereby allow the production of large gains — ive tate Ae now consider an arrangement similar to iuop fee ae tem (Figure 9-4} but with the level 0 added below the lower laser level, as shown in Figure 9-8. This arrangement is typical of many solid-state lasers. The level 0 is the ground state, and the majority of the atoms are initially in that level before pumping occurs. In this scheme, we neglect the upward rates You. Yoi. Vin. Yu. and Yui because of the large energy separation and the consequences of (9.7). The Spe cific downward rates y;;, Yio, and y,o are also neglected since they are very small in solid-state laser crystals of this type, Owing to the large energy separations of the Specific levels. We will assume that the dominant decay rate from level u to level 1 will most likely be radiative, but we must-keep in mind that yu: = Aw + 1/7)0, Yuta + Yew, = N= 0, Because No + N) + N, +N; = N, where N is the total number of laser (dopant ions) per unit volume and is therefore constant, we can easily lifferentiation thatdt” VetYu Ya Mm [2 + Yng = [OOE TOD La ox yo ¥0. Yo Again we consider the conditions for a population inversion by taking the ratio N,,/N), assuming again for simplicity that g, = g). We are thus led to the ratio Nu volo 2 a > MM yuil¥or+Tor} (9.31) D . We can approximate (9.32) asey Idi Garton act for © 2) 9 HE ip forthe rao yoy/yo- In effect, levels and u as well as | ‘brought to thermal distributions in times of the order of 10-8 err ollisio In both cases the lower of each pair of levels, u and 0, contain > ener 7). This can be expressed as Ni Nig g-SE w/t Nu iE Ne eg Stik. oa No In the case of the pair of levels i and u, it is desirable to have the population in level u since itis the upper laser level. In the case of the pair of levels / and O1t desirable to have most of it reside in level 0, but owi ‘ing to the close energy separa~ tion of / and Q and to the consequences of (9.7), enough population can bein To affect N; and thereby reduce the population inversion ANu-