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 Q-switched gas laser apparatus with bivariate pulse equalization includes a gas laser, a sensor, and an electronic circuit. A Q-switch that switches the laser resonator between high-loss and low-loss states to generate a pulsed laser beam. The sensor obtains a measurement of the pulsed laser beam indicative of the laser pulse energy. The electronic circuitry operates the Q-switch to (a) repeatedly switch the laser resonator between the high-loss and low-loss states to set a repetition rate of laser pulses of the pulsed laser beam, (b) adjust a loss level of the low-loss state, based on the pulse energy measurement, to achieve a target laser pulse energy, and (c) adjust a duration of the low-loss state to achieve a target laser pulse duration. By adjusting both pulse energy and duration, uniform pulse energy and, if desired, uniform pulse duration are achieved over a wide range of repetition rates.

A discharge excitation gas laser device may include a laser chamber in which a laser gas containing a halogen gas is encapsulated, a pair of discharge electrodes disposed to face each other inside the laser chamber, a fan disposed inside the laser chamber to make the laser gas flow between the pair of discharge electrodes, a motor for rotating the fan, a motor power supply for supplying power to the motor, a magnetic bearing configured to levitate the rotary shaft of the fan magnetically, a displacement sensor for detecting the position of the rotary shaft through a can, and a controller configured to measure the rotational speed of the fan on the basis of a detection signal from the displacement sensor and control the motor power supply in such a manner that the measured rotational speed becomes a target rotational speed.

Disclosed herein is a single pulse laser apparatus that includes: a resonator having a first mirror, a second mirror, a gain medium, an electro-optic modulator (EOM) configured to perform single pulse switching, and an acousto-optic modulator (AOM) configured to perform mode-locking; a photodiode configured to measure a laser beam oscillated in the resonator; a synchronizer configured to convert an electrical signal, which is generated by measuring the laser beam, into a transistor-transistor logic (TTL) signal; a delay unit configured to set a delay time for the TTL signal to synchronize the EOM and the AOM and output a trigger TTL signal according to the delay time; an AOM driver configured to input the trigger TTL signal to the AOM that performs mode-locking and drive the AOM; and an EOM driver configured to input the trigger TTL signal to the EOM that performs single pulse switching and drive the EOM.

There may be provided a laser unit including a display configured to display one or both of electric power consumed by the laser unit and electric energy consumed by the laser unit.

A calculation part calculates a maximum temperature reached which is reached by the coolant or component of each part, in the case of machining in accordance with laser machining conditions that were inputted or set, based on the cooling capacity of a chiller, tank volume of the chiller, heat generation amount from the laser oscillator, heat capacity of a cooled part of the laser device, etc. which are recorded in a recording part, and the temperature of each part measured by temperature detection parts, etc. In the case that the maximum temperature reached would exceed the allowed maximum temperature, a warning is made prior to starting laser machining.

A laser oscillation cooling device (100) is provided with a light emitting section (1) that emits laser excitation light (Z1), a laser excitation section (2) that excites the laser excitation light (Z1) to emit laser light (Z2) and locally generates heat, a storage tank (3) capable of storing an extremely low temperature liquid (L), a pressurizing section (31) that brings extremely low temperature liquid (L) into a sub-cool state by pressurizing the inside of the storage tank (3), and a jetting supply section (4) that removes heat from the laser excitation section (2) by jetting the extremely low temperature liquid (L) in the sub-cool state to the laser excitation section (2).

A laser system comprising a laser configured to emit a laser beam wherein the laser beam is linearly polarized in a polarization plane and an optical assembly comprising a partial reflector having a refractive index and comprising a partially reflective surface. The partially reflective surface is arranged to receive the laser beam at an angle of incidence which lies in a plane of incidence and reflect a portion of the laser beam such that the reflected portion is output from the optical assembly. The partially reflective surface is arranged such that the plane of incidence forms a polarization angle with the polarization plane of the laser beam and the laser beam includes a p-polarized component and an s-polarized component. The angle of incidence and the polarization angle are arranged such that a fraction of the laser beam which is output from the optical assembly, following reflection from the partially reflective surface, is substantially invariant with changes in at least one of the temperature of the partial reflector and a thickness of a contamination layer disposed on the partially reflective surface. The partially reflective surface is arranged to reflect a fraction of the laser beam which is greater than or equal to approximately 0.5% of the laser beam which is incident on the partially reflective surface.

An object information acquiring apparatus is used which includes a laser medium that oscillates laser light, an excitation source that excites the laser medium, a voltage accumulator that applies a voltage to the excitation source, a voltage supplier that supplies a voltage to the voltage accumulator, a voltage controller that limits a maximum supplied voltage from the voltage supplier, a receiver that receives a photoacoustic wave generated by an object irradiated with the laser light, and a constructor that acquires characteristic information relating to the object in use of the photoacoustic wave, wherein the voltage controller compares a measured voltage value obtained by implementing division of a supplied voltage from the voltage supplier with a reference voltage value defining the maximum supplied voltage.

The embodiments of the present invention disclose a method and an apparatus for determining a gain of a Raman optical amplifier and a Raman optical amplifier. The method includes: acquiring present gain parameter information of a Raman optical amplifier; and determining a present gain of a monitoring channel of the Raman optical amplifier according to the present gain parameter information and a correspondence between a gain of the monitoring channel of the Raman optical amplifier and gain parameter information. According to the method and apparatus for determining a gain of a Raman optical amplifier and the Raman optical amplifier that are in embodiments of the present invention, a present gain of a monitoring channel can be accurately determined; therefore, a gain spectrum of the Raman optical amplifier can be accurately monitored, and the gain of the Raman optical amplifier can be accurately adjusted to a target gain.