A laser apparatus includes a light source configured to output excitation light, an optical resonator in which laser medium is excited by the excitation light, the optical resonator being configured to output laser beam, a temperature regulator configured to adjust temperature of the light source to a standard temperature, an optical detector configured to detect output power of the laser beam, and a controller configured to change the standard temperature based on the detected output power of the laser beam.

A laser system includes a master oscillator, which emits a train of optical seed pulses with variable intervals between the pulses. An optical power amplifier includes an optical gain medium, which receives and amplifies the optical seed pulses from the master oscillator, and a pump, which applies pump radiation to the optical gain medium. A pulse generator applies a control input to the master oscillator, which causes the intervals between the optical seed pulses to vary by at least 50% at a rate of change that is greater than a response frequency of the optical gain medium. A control unit drives the pump responsively to predicted intervals between the optical seed pulses, at a variable pump power selected so that the pulse amplitudes of the output pulses vary by no more than 20% irrespective of the varying intervals between the optical seed pulses.

A fiber amplifier system including an optical source providing an optical seed beam and an FM electro-optic modulator (EOM) that frequency modulates the seed beam to broaden its spectral linewidth. The system also includes an AM EOM that modulates the seed beam to provide an amplitude modulated seed beam that is synchronized with the frequency modulated seed beam. The system also includes a non-linear fiber amplifier receiving the AM and FM modulated seed beam, wherein the amplitude modulated seed beam causes self-phase modulation in the fiber amplifier that phase modulates the seed beam as it is being amplified by the fiber amplifier that acts to cancel the spectral linewidth broadening caused by the frequency modulation.

Described herein are methods for developing and maintaining pulses that are produced from compact resonant cavities using one or more Q-switches and maintaining the output parameters of these pulses created during repetitive pulsed operation. The deterministic control of the evolution of a Q-switched laser pulse is complicated due to dynamic laser cavity feedback effects and unpredictable environmental inputs. Laser pulse shape control in a compact laser cavity (e.g., length/speed of light <?1 ns) is especially difficult because closed loop control becomes impossible due to causality. Because various issues cause laser output of these compact resonator cavities to drift over time, described herein are further methods for automatically maintaining those output parameters.

A system includes a laser source configured to generate one or more bursts of laser pulses and a data collection and analysis system. The data collection and analysis system is configured to receive, from the laser source, data associated with the one or more bursts of laser pulses and determine, based on the received data, that the one or more bursts of laser pulses are for external use. The data collection and analysis system is further configured to determine, based on the received data, whether the one or more bursts of laser pulses are for an on-wafer operation or are for a calibration operation.

A laser light-source apparatus includes a control unit configured to perform control in such a manner that a seed light source is driven in a pulse oscillation mode of oscillating pulse light based on gain switching in an output permitted state where output of pulse light from the apparatus is permitted, and is driven in a continuous oscillation mode of oscillating continuous light in an output stopped state in which the output of the pulse light from the apparatus is stopped, with power of excitation light for a solid state amplifier maintained, and adjusts power of laser light input to the solid state amplifier from the seed light source in the continuous oscillation mode in such a manner that the solid state amplifier outputs light with substantially same average power in the output stopped state and in the output permitted state.

The present disclosure relates a laser arrangement (1) and a method of the laser arrangement, arranged to output energy in the form of laser emission, for emitting controlled Q-switched laser emission. The laser arrangement comprises a gain medium (2) arranged to be excited when pumped, an optical resonator (3), an active Q-switch (4) arranged in the optical resonator, said active Q-switch (4) being controllable between at least a high loss state and a low loss state, and being arranged to introduce loss in the optical resonator to prevent lasing in the high loss state and to affect lasing minimally in the low loss state, a photo detector (5) arranged to detect the presence of a free running pulse (1) generated by the optical resonator and which occurs when a lasing threshold is reached and a processing circuitry (6) arranged to control (S4) of the state of the active Q-switch based on the detection of the free running pulse.

Techniques for controlling an optical system include accessing a measured value of a property of a particular pulse of a pulsed light beam emitted from the optical system, the property being related to an amount of coherence of the light beam; comparing the measured value of the property of the light beam to a target value of the property; determining whether to generate a control signal based on the comparison; and if a control signal is generated based on the comparison, adjusting the amount of coherence in the light beam by modifying an aspect of the optical system based on the control signal to reduce an amount of coherence of a pulse that is subsequent to the particular pulse.

An apparatus (such as a laser-based system) and method for providing optical pulses in a broad range of pulse widths and pulse energies uses a pulse slicer which is configured to slice a predefined portion having a desired pulse width of each of the one or more output optical pulses from a laser oscillator, in which timings of a rising edge and a falling edge of each sliced optical pulse relative to a time instance of a maximum of the corresponding each of the one or more output optical pulses from the laser oscillator, are chosen at least to maximize amplification efficiency of the optical amplifier, which may be located after the pulse slicer, and to provide the one or more amplified output optical pulses each having the desired pulse energy and pulse width.

A single loop hardware-based system for producing laser pulses in a microsecond scale operational mode includes a GUI to enable a user to select the operational mode of the system; a laser source for producing one or more laser beam pulses, the laser source being a diode laser pump source module; a DSP which enables and disables a hardware-based FPGA. The FPGA controls the diode pump source module. When a user selects one or more microsecond scale laser sub-pulses on the GUI, the DSP transmits to the FPGA the sub-pulse energy level and the sub-pulse on-time selected by the user on the GUI. A photodetector operatively connected to the hardware-based system measures the power of the laser pulse beam that was transmitted to the photodetector and, in a feedback mode, transmits a feedback signal of that power measurement to the FPGA. The FPGA compares the power of the laser beam measured by the photodetector to the power of the laser beam selected by the user on the GUI. If the power level read by the FPGA is higher than the selected power level, the FGPA decreases the power level to the pumping source module for any subsequent laser pulses; and if the power level read by the FPGA is less than the selected power level, the FGPA increases the power level to the pumping source module for subsequent laser pulses.