Compact XeF (C → A) and iodine laser optically pumped by a surface discharge

A compact surface-discharge laser system has been developed and applied to optically pumping the bound → free XeF (C → A) transition that lases in the blue-green (475–490-nm) and the ²P_½ → ²P_3/2 transition of atomic iodine at 1.315 μm. Employing no high voltage or current switches and occupying only ∼1 m² of table space, this device has an active length of ∼50 cm and at present dissipates >8 MW/cm of surface discharge for a stored energy of 2.5 kJ. With 5% output coupling at 485 nm, energies of >50 mJ are obtained on the XeF (C → A) transition in 1.5-μs (FWHM) pulses. The spectrum of the untuned oscillator is virtually free of absorption features and has a width of ∼15 nm (FWHM). Pulse energies exceeding 0.7 J have been obtained for iodine at 1.3 μm with an output coupling of only 10%.