LASER AMPLIFIER APPARATUS AND METHOD OF AMPLIFYING LASER PULSES

Abstract

Laser amplifier apparatus 100 includes gain medium 10 for receiving seed pulse(s) 2 and pump pulse(s) 3 and for emitting laser pulse(s) 1, resonator device 20 including gain medium and resonator mirrors spanning resonator beam path 25 with multi-pass geometry, coupler arrangement 30 for coupling seed pulse(s) and pump pulse(s) to resonator device and coupling output laser pulse(s) out of resonator device, and gain medium cooling device 40A. Resonator mirrors include first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 with mutual distance and common focal section therebetween and defining optical axis z of resonator device, and first and second groups of end mirrors 23, 24 between mirrors 21 and 22 for forming path 25, wherein end mirrors are on ring-shaped section surrounding optical axis z, and resonator are arranged such that emitting sections of the gain medium are imaged in themselves. A method of amplifying laser pulses is also described.

Claims

1. A laser amplifier apparatus, configured for creating laser pulses by optical amplification, comprising: a gain medium arranged for receiving at least one seed pulse and at least one pump pulse and for emitting at least one optically amplified output laser pulse, a resonator device including the gain medium and comprising a plurality of resonator mirrors spanning a folded, telescopic resonator beam path with a multi-pass geometry, so that multiple passages of the seed and pump pulses through the gain medium are provided, a coupler arrangement configured for coupling the at least one seed pulse and the at least one pump pulse to the resonator device and for coupling the output laser pulses out of the resonator device, and a cooling device arranged for cooling the gain medium, wherein the resonator mirrors comprise a first telescope mirror and a second telescope mirror being arranged with a mutual distance and a common focal section therebetween and defining an optical axis of the resonator device, and a first group of end mirrors and a second group of end mirrors being arranged between the first and second telescope mirrors for forming the folded resonator beam path, wherein each of the first and second groups of end mirrors are arranged on a ring-shaped section surrounding the optical axis, and the resonator mirrors are arranged such that emitting sections of the gain medium are imaged in themselves.

2. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the gain medium is a composite disk gain element comprising a doped laser active part bonded to a non-doped part, wherein the disk gain element is shaped with a plane surface facing to the resonator beam path, a backplane surface and a curved surface for deflecting spontaneous emission out of the resonator beam path.

3. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the doped laser active part and the non-doped part have different crystalline orientations relative to the optical axis of the resonator device.

4. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein at least one of the doped laser active part and the non-doped part of the composite disk gain element comprises at least one of multiple bonded disk sectors and multiple sub-disks, wherein each of the disk sectors or sub-discs comprises a mono-crystalline material having no or negligible crystal defects.

5. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 4, wherein the disk sectors or sub-discs of the doped laser active part or the disk sectors or sub-discs of the non-doped part have different crystalline orientations relative to the optical axis of the resonator device.

6. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the composite disk gain element has a spatial orientation such that the plane surface of the composite disk gain element is perpendicular to a horizontal axis.

7. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the composite disk gain element has a diameter in a range from 5 mm to 10 cm.

8. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the curved surface of the composite disk gain element is a section of a parabolic surface.

9. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the curved surface of the composite disk gain element is defined in cylindrical coordinates with origin at a center of the plane surface by z(r)=6.28−1.70*r+0.106*r.sup.2, with r≥10 mm and 0≤z(r)≤10 mm.

10. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the composite disk gain element comprises Yb:YAG or Yb:LuAG.

11. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the doped laser active part of the composite disk gain element is doped with Yb.

12. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the plane surface of the composite disk gain element has an anti-reflective coating.

13. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the backplane surface has a dielectric high-reflective coating.

14. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the gain medium is arranged in a central opening of the first telescope mirror.

15. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the cooling device is thermally coupled with a narrow side of the curved surface of the gain medium.

16. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the coupler arrangement comprises a first coupler device configured for coupling the pump pulses to the resonator device, wherein the first coupler device comprises at least one incoupling mirror being arranged in the resonator device between the telescopic mirrors with an inclination relative to the optical axis of the resonator device.

17. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 16, wherein the at least one incoupling mirror is arranged at the focal section between the first and second telescope mirrors.

18. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 16, wherein the first coupler device provides a pinhole in a Fourier plane relative to the gain medium.

19. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 16, wherein the first coupler device comprises at least two incoupling mirrors being arranged for coupling pump pulses from different directions to the resonator device.

20. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 16, wherein the first coupler device is coupled with a main cooling system.

21. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the coupler arrangement comprises a second coupler device being configured for coupling the seed pulses to the resonator device and for coupling the output laser pulses out of the resonator device, wherein the second coupler device comprises one of the resonator mirrors of the second group of end mirrors as an outcoupling mirror and a polarizing beam splitter.

22. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the laser amplifier apparatus includes a housing with a housing wall, wherein the resonator mirrors are carried on an inner side of the housing wall.

23. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the resonator device is free of optical lenses.

24. The laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the laser amplifier apparatus includes a pump source device with at least one pump pulse laser source arranged for creating a sequence of pump pulses and a seed source device with at least one seed pulse laser source arranged for creating a sequence of seed pulses.

25. A method of amplifying laser pulses, wherein the laser amplifier apparatus according to claim 1 is used, comprising the steps of: creating at least one seed pulse and at least one pump pulse, coupling the at least one seed pulse and the at least one pump pulse to the resonator device and irradiating the gain medium, wherein multiple passages of the seed and pump pulses through the gain medium are provided by the plurality of resonator mirrors of the folded, telescopic resonator beam path with the multi-pass geometry, and coupling at least one output laser pulse amplified in the gain medium out of the resonator device.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0050] Further details and advantages of the invention are described in the following with reference to the attached drawings, which schematically show in:

[0051] FIG. 1: a sectional side view of the resonator device in a laser amplifier apparatus according to an embodiment of the invention;

[0052] FIG. 2: a perspective view of the beam path in FIG. 1;

[0053] FIG. 3: details of a gain medium in a laser amplifier apparatus according to an embodiment of the invention;

[0054] FIG. 4: a perspective outer view of a laser amplifier apparatus according to an embodiment of the invention;

[0055] FIG. 5: an exploded view of components of the laser amplifier apparatus according to FIG. 4;

[0056] FIGS. 6A and 6B: details of a first coupler device for coupling pump pulses to the resonator device of a laser amplifier apparatus according to an embodiment of the invention; and

[0057] FIG. 7: details of a gain medium carrier in a laser amplifier apparatus according to an embodiment of the invention.

PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION

[0058] Features of preferred embodiments of the invention are described in the following with exemplary reference to a laser amplifier apparatus to be used as an ICS source for the production X-rays. The implementation of the invention is not restricted to this particular application. For other applications, the geometry and/or dimensions in particular of the resonator beam path, the gain medium, the coupling arrangement and the main cooling system and the cooling device can be modified.

[0059] FIGS. 1 and 2 show the gain medium 10 and the resonator device 20 included in a housing 50 (not shown in FIG. 2) according to a preferred embodiment of the laser amplifier apparatus 100. FIG. 1 shows a schematic diagram of an image-relayed 16-pass architecture of the resonator device 20 with output (1) and input beams (2, 3) with one of four full transit “rings” at a mid-plane, while FIG. 2 is a full 3-dimensional ray trace of the multi-pass architecture and the main optical components. With more details, the resonator device 20 comprises multiple resonator mirrors spanning a folded resonator beam path. The resonator mirrors comprise a first telescope mirror 21 having a central hole 21A, through which the gain medium 10 is irradiated, a second telescope mirror 22, a first group of end mirrors 23 and a second group of end mirrors 24. The mirrors are supported by mirror carriers, which are not shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 (further details see FIG. 5).

[0060] The first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 are arranged with a mutual distance along the optical axis (z-axis). Each of the first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 is a curved, preferably parabolic, mirror, e.g., with a 1-meter radius of curvature or similar, with a predetermined focus on the z-axis. Preferably, a light field circulating in the resonator device can be focused in the focal section to a beam diameter in a range from 0.025 mm to 0.060 mm. The first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 are arranged such their foci have a common position on the z-axis, thus providing a common focal section. Preferably, the focal sections coincide in the middle between the first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22. The first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 have a diameter of e.g., 10 cm, and they are made of e.g., suprasil or infrasil or a high grade silica glass not absorbing pump light. The distance between the first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 is selected in a range from 0.5 to 1 meter, substantially equal to the radius of curvature.

[0061] Each of the first and second groups of end mirrors 23, 24 comprises 8 plane mirrors being arranged on a ring-shaped section surrounding the optical axis, in particular a circle, which extends in a plane perpendicular to the optical axis. Each of the end mirrors 23, 24 has a reflective surface facing to one of the first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 and having an inclination relative to the optical axis. In the center of each of the first and second groups of end mirrors 23, 24, sufficient space for passing the light field from the first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 to the focal section is provided. The end mirrors 23, 24 have a diameter of e.g., 2.5 to 3.5 cm, and they are made of e.g., fused silica or high grade BK7. The distance between the each of the first and second groups of end mirrors 23, 24 and the respective first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 is e.g., equal to the individual mirror's radius of curvature or the sum of the focal lengths.

[0062] FIGS. 1 and 2 further show a coupler arrangement 30 comprising a first coupler device 31 for coupling the pump pulses 3 to the resonator device 20 and a second coupler device 36 for coupling the seed pulses 2 to the resonator device 20 and for coupling the amplified output laser pulses 1 out of the resonator device 20.

[0063] The first coupler device 31 comprises at least one plane or curved incoupling mirror 32, which has a reflective surface with an inclination, e.g., about 45°, relative to the optical axis such that the pump pulses 3 being directed from an axial side to the resonator device 10, e.g., with an angle of 90° to the optical axis, are deflected to the gain medium 10. The at least one incoupling mirror 32 is arranged such that the reflective surface thereof has a distance from the optical axis, so that the light field travelling between the first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 can pass the at least one incoupling mirror 32. Preferably, the at least one incoupling mirror 32 is arranged on an incoupling mirror carrier 31A (see FIG. 6B) with a central pinhole 38, which is positioned at the common focal section of the first and second telescope mirrors 21, 22 and in a Fourier plane relative to the gain medium 10.

[0064] With preferred applications, the first coupler device 31 comprises two incoupling mirrors, including the first mirror 33 (first pump pulse deflector 33, preferably a flat mirror), and the second mirror 32 of pyramidal shape with one of four inclined gold-coated facets 32A, 32B, being arranged for coupling pump pulses 3 from different directions to the resonator device 20, thus allowing in-coupling output of two pump sources to the resonator device 20. Further details of the two incoupling facet mirrors 32A, 32B are described below with reference to FIGS. 6A and 6B.

[0065] Preferably, each incoupling mirror 32 is combined with a plane or curved first pump pulse deflector 33 directing pump pulses from a pulsed fiber-delivered diode pump source device 60 (not shown in FIG. 2) with a diode pulse laser 61, from a telescopic projector 62 with e.g., 4 kW output power, to the incoupling mirror 32. Furthermore, the incoupling mirror 32 preferably is combined with another incoupling mirror 34 directing pump pulses after passage through the resonator device 20 and pumping interaction with the gain medium 10 to a second pump pulse deflector 35. The second deflector 35 is a curved back-reflector being arranged for reflecting the pump pulses back for a second passage through the resonator device 20 and a further pumping interaction with the gain medium 10.

[0066] The first pump deflector 33 is a dielectric coated fused silica or BK7 45-degree laser mirror, e.g., 50 mm in diameter (commercially available), the second pump deflector 35 is a plano concave laser mirror, e.g., 50 mm in diameter (commercially available), the pyramidal incoupling mirror 32 is customized fabricated with cooling channels of oxygen-free copper and four polished gold coated facets 32A, 32B, 34A, 34B in the shape of a pyramid with 70 mm base and 50 mm height at a 44 degree angle to the z-axis and included thru hole along its axis 38 6 mm in diameter to make space for the Fourier plane pinhole.

[0067] The second coupler device 36 comprises one of the resonator mirrors, like the end mirror 24 as an outcoupling mirror and a beam splitter plate 37. The beam splitter plate 37 is a polarizing beam splitter passing seed pulses 2 with a center wavelength of 1029.5 nm from a seed pulse source 70, comprising a laser system developed before and described in the background reference [5], to the resonator device 20 and reflecting output pulses 1 with a center wavelength of 1029.5 nm to an application site, like e.g., an interaction area in an experiment or a workpiece to be irradiated.

[0068] The housing 50 has a housing wall 51, which is made of aluminum with built in cooling passages and precision machined reference surfaces for the placement of optics and positioning internal hardware. Furthermore, the housing wall 51 includes transparent vacuum sealed windows for transmitting the pump, seed and output pulses and for monitoring purposes. Further details of the housing are shown in FIG. 4.

[0069] In the resonator device 20, the resonator mirrors 21, 22, 23 and 24 span a folded, telescopic resonator beam path 25 with a multi-pass geometry including the gain medium 10. Firstly, the pump pulses 3 travel via the first coupling device 31 and the seed pulses 2 travel via the second coupling device 36 to the gain medium 10. The pump pulses 3 are absorbed in the gain medium 10 and store energy in metastable states of Yb3+ during the pumping period lasting a few hundred microseconds, a corresponding seed pulse 2 arriving at the end of the pumping period extracts partially the stored energy by the process of stimulated emission. The amplified pulses travel via the first group of end mirrors 23 where they are reflected back to the first telescopic mirror 21, reflected again to the second telescopic mirror 22 and subsequently to the second group of end mirrors 24 and the opposite direction back to the gain medium 10 for another amplification. After 16 passages through the gain medium 10, the end mirror 24 is reached, which simultaneously provides the outcoupling mirror, for a deflection to the beam splitter plate 37. The resonator mirrors 21 to 24 are configured such that emitting sections of the gain medium 10 are imaged in themselves.

[0070] In the illustrated embodiment of FIGS. 1 and 2, the diode-pumped gain medium 10 is placed at a conjugate relay plane within an imaging multipass amplification network. The optical architecture transports a polarized beam of seed pulses 2 through 8 image-relayed round-trips (16 gain passes) during amplification. p-polarized seed pulses 2 are transmitted through the polarizing beam splitter 37 and a quarter-wave plate 26 to become a circularly polarized input redirected to circulate off-axis describing a ring-shaped path in a mid-plane of the afocal telescope formed by the two telescopic mirrors 21, 22. The cooled tapered pinhole 38 adjacent to the incoupling mirror 32 provides a spatial filter at the common focus of the telescopic mirrors 21, 22 for smoothing any unexpected high frequency perturbations thus avoiding high intensity ripples throughout the transit. The gain medium 10 is strategically located and accessible through the hole 21A in the middle of the first telescopic mirror 21. The end mirrors 23, 24 being arranged in roof-top pairs rotate the plane of the ring-shaped optical path four times before the amplifying beam encounters the back mirror which returns the beam retracing its incoming path for another four rings passing the quarter wave plate where the polarization emerges rotated 90° relative to the input to become the output 1 at the high power polarizing beam splitter plate 37 where the input beam of seed pulses 2 and output beams are passively routed.

[0071] With more details, the p-polarized beam of seed pulses 2 from the seed pulse source 70 enters a vacuum side window and is redirected by a prism mirror of switch-yard (24) parallel to the optical axis z reflecting off the first parabolic mirror 22 towards the spatial filter at the confocal plane to hit the second, preferably identical parabolic mirror 21, and after reflection from another flat mirror 23 projects—passing through the hole in the middle of the second parabolic mirror 21—onto an image plane located at the composite disk 10. The reflected beam double-passes the energized disk before it hits a diametrically opposed flat mirror to follow a symmetrical path through the system, projecting a conjugate image plane between steerable HR-coated 45° prisms in the switchyard. This completes a full 4-f round-trip as the transit plane rotates for a second 4-f round-trip and so on four times, enabling 8-passes in a strict image-relay layout. A flat high-reflective mirror and quarter-wave plate in the switchyard send the beam back through the system, adding 8 more passes with an s-polarized beam. Finally, a polarizing beam splitter 37 separates the amplified beam 1 from the input.

[0072] FIG. 1 further schematically shows a main cooling system 40 based on a commercial chiller providing temperature controlled water to maintain a constant temperature+/−0.1 C of the housing 50, the housing wall 51 and the incoupling mirror/pinhole assembly 32, 34, 38. Furthermore, a cooling device 40A is used to cool the gain-assembly 42 and gain medium 10. The preferred cryogenic cooling device 40A is based on a commercially available closed cycle cryogenic chiller. Optionally, the cooling device 40A may be based on a cooling device using liquid nitrogen as the cooling fluid.

[0073] FIG. 3 illustrates further details of the gain medium 10, which is shown with a perspective view (FIG. 3A) and side views perpendicular to and along (FIG. 3B) the optical axis (z-axis) as well with an illustration of the crystal orientations of the gain medium materials (FIG. 3C). The gain medium 10 is a composite disk gain element comprising a plate-shaped doped laser active part 11 bonded to a plate-shaped non-doped part 12. A larger plane surface 13 of the non-doped part 12 is perpendicular to the z axis, and it faces to the resonator beam path 25. A curved parabolic surface 14 of the gain medium 10, including radially outer surfaces of the materials 11, 12, is formed for deflecting spontaneous emission out of the resonator beam path 25. A smaller plane surface 15 of the gain medium at the doped laser active part 11 is perpendicular to the z axis.

[0074] The composite gain medium 10 is coated with an antireflective (AR) multilayer dielectric coating on its larger plane surface 13 and a high-reflective (HR) multilayer dielectric coating on its smaller backplane surface 15. Advantageously, this facilitates a lossless two-pass transit of the amplifying pulses into the gain medium 10.

[0075] The doped laser active part 11 comprises crystalline YAG doped with Yb, e.g., Yb.sup.3+:YAG with 5% Yb, with a disk thickness d.sub.1 of e.g., 2 mm and a diameter D.sub.1 at the smaller plane surface 15 of e.g., 20 mm. The non-doped part 12 comprises non-doped crystalline YAG, with a thickness d.sub.2 of e.g.,

[0076] 8 mm and a diameter D.sub.2 at the larger plane surface 13 of e.g., 36 mm. The outer curved surface 14 is a parabolic surface. It is defined in cylindrical coordinates with origin at the center of the plane surface 13 by z(r)=6.28-1.70*r+0.106*r.sup.2, preferably with r≥10 mm and 0≤z(r)≤10 mm.

[0077] The doped laser active part 11 and/or the non-doped part 12 of the composite disk gain element preferably is made of multiple bonded sectors 16 (schematically illustrated with dotted lines) and/or sub-disks (different doped layers, not shown), wherein each of the sectors and/or sub-disks is made of a mono-crystalline material having no or negligible crystal defects. As an example, a preferred configuration is found by including two 1 mm active parts, one made of Yb:LuAG and a second made of Yb:YAG integrated to the gain medium as the laser active part 11. Advantageously, the provision of the sub-disks allows to modify the overall gain profile of the gain medium 10.

[0078] The gain medium 10 preferably is manufactured by growing of mono-crystalline materials with one of available growing methods, testing the crystallinity of the grown mono-crystalline materials, selecting sections with no or negligible crystal defects, cutting the selected sections with adapted shapes of disk sectors and/or sub-disks, and bonding and surface finishing of the selected sections as disk sectors 16 and/or sub-disks for providing the composite gain medium 10. Bonding is obtained e.g., by the commercially available method of Adhesive Free Bonding, alternatively, other methods involving contacting the surfaces free of voids under heat and pressure such that they become strongly adhered under van der Waals forces. Accordingly, a large gain medium can be provided with a zero or negligible crystal defect concentration as obtained by available growing methods in limited volume portions.

[0079] Preferably, the crystal orientation of the non-doped part 12 is different than the doped laser active part 11 as illustrated in FIG. 3C. Different crystal orientation means that the doped laser active part 11 and the non-doped part 12 are bonded with different orientations of bonded crystal planes. Furthermore, the crystal orientation of the sectors, e.g., of the non-doped part 12 and/or the doped laser active part 11 may be different from each other.

[0080] For instance, the doped laser active part 11 is cut normal to the crystal axis [111], and the non-doped part 12 is cut normal to the crystal axis [112]. FIG. 3D illustrates the corresponding azimuthal rotation of the components about the z-axis. The crystal axis [110] of the non-doped part 12 is rotated counter-clockwise by 208° from the crystal axis [112] of the doped laser active part 11. The axis of rotation is the z-axis, i.e., the cylindrical symmetry axis of the gain medium 10. Simultaneously, the axes [111] of the doped laser active part 11 and [112] of the non-doped part 12 are aligned with the z-axis. Similarly, the crystal orientation of the sectors may differ from each other.

[0081] The basic principle of operation the laser amplifier apparatus 100 using a composite disk gain medium with a curved outer surface is described in [4], which is introduced to the present specification by reference, in particular with regard to the outer shape design of the gain medium and the pulse amplification therein. Supported by its geometry, the composite gain medium 10 used according to the invention can store a significantly higher amount of optical energy than other disk-shaped gain-elements of comparable aperture. In the present embodiment the above exemplary dimensions allow the storage of 2 to 4 joules before the effects of Amplified Spontaneous Emission (ASE) becomes limiting.

[0082] FIG. 4 is perspective outer view of the fully assembled laser amplifier apparatus 100, including the housing 50 with a pressure tight housing wall 51. FIG. 5 shows all mechanical components, the mirrors 21, 22, 23 and 24 and the gain medium 10 of the laser amplifier apparatus 100 connected with the housing wall 51 in an exploded view.

[0083] The housing 50 accommodates the resonator device, the gain medium, parts of the cooling system 40 and the cooling device 40A and parts of the coupling arrangement (see e.g., FIGS. 1 and 2) as an evacuable container. The housing 50 is supported by a support structure 52, e.g., on a table of an experimental setup or a manufacturing plant, and it comprises a pump interface (not shown) for connecting the housing 50 with a vacuum pump device (not shown). The housing wall 51 is composed of multiple wall sections being adapted for particular tasks, like monitoring the laser amplifier apparatus 100, incoupling and outcoupling light fields, connecting cooling supply lines and transmitting adjustment drive actions. Furthermore, the housing wall 51 provides a support for the resonator mirrors 21, 22, 23 and 24 and the gain medium 10, which are carried on an inner side of the housing wall 51, and for the diode pulse laser 61 of the pump source device 60 and the pump pulse deflectors 33 on an outer side of the housing wall 51 (see FIG. 5). The housing wall 51 is made of e.g., aluminum and/or steel and transparent materials, like glass, for window portions.

[0084] Components of the housing 50 are assembled by blocks that come together with built in cooling channels designed to remove the heat generated after the absorption of the excess fluorescence and in keeping an isothermal environment thus avoiding mechanical deformations and instabilities due to unrestrained heating. With more details, the blocks of the housing wall 51 comprise a first telescopic mirror support section 53, a second telescopic mirror support section 54, a first end mirror support section 55, a second end mirror support section 56 and an incoupling mirror support section 57.

[0085] Each of the first and second telescopic mirror support sections 53, 54 carry one of the first and second telescopic mirrors 21, 22 (see FIGS. 1, 2 and 5) in an adjustable manner. The first and second telescopic mirror support sections 53, 54 include adjustment devices 58 for adjusting the position and orientation of the first and second telescopic mirrors 21, 22 relative to each other and to the optical axis of the resonator device 20. The adjustment devices 58 comprise e.g., motorized adjusting screws.

[0086] Each of the first and second end mirror support section 55, 56 carry one of first and second groups of end mirrors 23, 24 (see FIGS. 1, 2 and 5), preferably in an adjustable manner. Again, adjustment devices can be provided for adjusting the position and orientation of the first and second end mirrors 23, 24 relative to each other and to the next telescopic mirrors 21, 22, resp. Furthermore, the first and second end mirror support section 55, 56 include supply interfaces 44 for connecting supply lines 43 of the main cooling system 40 (see FIG. 1). Furthermore, the first end mirror support section 55 carries the diode pulse lasers 61 of the pump source device 60 on an outer side of the housing wall 51 (see FIGS. 1, 5).

[0087] The central incoupling mirror support section 57 carries the incoupling mirror carrier 31A of the incoupling mirrors 32A, 32B on an inner side of the housing wall 51 and the pump pulse deflectors 33 on an outer side of the housing wall 51 (see FIGS. 1, 5, 6A and 6B).

[0088] The housing 50 is a precision component designed using CAD programs and machined of suitable materials such as aluminum and/or steel. By the above support function, the housing 50 provides reference surfaces that register optical elements at their prescribed positions numerically calculated using ray-tracing programs and within specified tolerances achievable by CNC machining. By the pressure tight materials, the housing 50 creates an evacuated environment improving the efficiency of cryogenic operation, and keeping optical surfaces dust-free and, convenient for the propagation high intensity beams void of non-linear and thermally induced gas turbulence effects. Furthermore, the housing 50 provides internal containment surfaces which can be treated to effectively absorb and diffusely reflect any excess fluorescence generated by the gain medium during operation.

[0089] Further details of the first coupler device 31 are shown in FIGS. 6A and 6B, which schematically illustrates how the pump pulses 3 from the pump source device 60 (see FIGS. 1, 4 and 5) are directed towards the incoupling mirrors 32A, 32B for a first pass (FIGS. 6A, 6B) and then re-imaged onto the further incoupling mirrors 34A, 34B for a second pass by use of plane auxiliary mirrors 36A, 36B and the curved second pump pulse deflectors 35A, 35B.

[0090] The incoupling mirrors 32A, 32B, 34A and 34B are arranged on the incoupling mirror carrier 31A, which is a pyramid-shape optic block made of e.g., copper and located at the common focal section between the first and second telescopic mirrors 21, 22. The mirror carrier 31A has the through-hole 38 being aligned with optical axis of the resonator device 20 and in coincidence with the beam path between the first and second telescopic mirrors 21, 22. The internal through-hole 38 provides a spatial filter for the multi-pass amplification. The incoupling mirrors 32A, 32B, 34A and 34B are provided by surfaces of the mirror carrier 31A plated with a reflective material, like e.g., gold.

[0091] The four gold-plated surfaces serve to direct the optical power from the two 4-kW fiber delivered diode pump sources 61, 62 towards the gain medium 10 (see FIGS. 1, 4 and 5). The cryogenically cooled Yb:YAG gain medium 10 affords nearly 90% absorption of the 940 nm diode pump light re-directed by a first gold-plated surface providing the first auxiliary mirror 34A. The remaining pump light is collected by a second gold-plated surface providing the second auxiliary mirror 34B and re-circulated for a second bounce to reach near full absorption of the pump light. To do this the 45° mirrors 36A, 36B and the curved pump pulse deflectors 35A, 35B of 800 mm radius of curvature combine to re-image the pump light onto the gain medium 10. Dichroic coatings are used to reflect the 940 nm pump light transmitting at 1030 nm to avoid parasitic lasing.

[0092] FIG. 7 shows details of a gain medium carrier 70 being arranged in the housing 50 for positioning the gain medium 10 (not shown in FIG. 7) near a central hole 21A of the first telescopic mirror (not shown in FIG. 7). The smaller backplane surface 15 of the gain medium 10 (see FIG. 3) is attached to a heat-spreader body 71, which is made of e.g., sapphire. Bonding of the gain medium with the heat-spreader body 71 is obtained e.g., by an indium layer. The heat-spreader body 71 is attached to a cryogenic chiller block 72 of the cooling device 40A (see FIG. 1), also using an indium layer bonding.

[0093] The cryogenic chiller block 72 cools the gain-assembly and is capable of rejecting a heat-load of 200 Watts at 90 K from a 38 mm diameter cold finger. The cryogenic chiller block 72 comprises a commercial cryogenic chiller (e.g., manufactured by CryoSpectra GmbH). The gain-assembly is designed to transfer quantum-defect heat evolved in operation of the laser amplifier apparatus while keeping the gain medium peak temperature preferably below 120 K in order to harvest the engineering leverage resulting from enhanced thermo-mechanical, thermo-optical and spectroscopic properties attained by the gain medium below that temperature.

[0094] Practical embodiments of the inventive laser amplifier apparatus have been tested with the following results. Laboratory embodiments demonstrated diffraction limited performance of 1 Joule at up to 300 Hz with 20 ns narrow band pulses, up to 1.5 or even 2 Joules at 500 Hz, when using chirped-pulse seed pulses. When combined with the Chirped Pulse Amplification (CPA) technique, the inventive laser amplifier apparatus produces compressed 1-Joule laser pulses of <5 ps duration, thus providing e.g., an ICS source for use in the production X-rays. With more details, with the seed pulse input of about 50 to 60 mJ the following table summarizes the performance:

TABLE-US-00001 Repetition rate Diode pump (avg) Pulse energy (mJ) (Hz) (W) Total run-time (h) 500 100 200 20 1000+ 100 200 10 1000+ 200 400 4 1000+ 300 600 2 900 400 800 0.75 850 500 1000 0.75

[0095] While the laser amplifier apparatus has been operated according to the above results with diffraction limited performance that is regularly obtained at up to 1 J per pulse at 300 Hz, extracting up to 2 Joules per pulse is possible as well. Experimental data show that the optical-to-optical efficiency surpasses 50% (output to input energy efficiency). A beam diameter in the near-field of about 18 mm was obtained and exhibits a supergaussian appearance indicative of saturated extraction. The far-field shows a near diffraction-limited spot on top of a dim scatter background. The measured laser output power and pointing have shown a high pointing stability which, even can be improved by enclosing the beam path from a lab environment and an active stabilizer. The average output power stability at repetition rates lower than 300 Hz was found to be ±0.3% and remained flat for up to 3 hours in several tests.

[0096] The features of the invention disclosed in the above description, the drawings and the claims can be of significance individually, in combination or sub-combination for the implementation of the invention in its different embodiments.