Since the early days of the laser discovery, wideband optical gain in any region of the electro-magnetic spectrum has suggested to the spectroscopists immediate applications. Laser tunability, presently offered by a few laser types, allows for an easy radiation-matter interaction, useful for linear and non-linar spectroscopy. On the other hand wideband tunable lasers in the visible such as dye lasers show photochemical degradation (bleaching) which reduces to some extent their applications. Furthermore the ultraviolet region is covered essentially by second-harmonic generation with a large expense of intensity. These considerations justify for a search of other types of laser materials capable of wideband optical gain in the visible'and uv regions, and not suffering the over-mentioned limitations.

Date Published: 1 January 1987
PDF: 4 pages
Proc. SPIE 0813, Optics and the Information Age, (1 January 1987); doi: 10.1117/12.967363

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 0813:
Optics and the Information Age
Henri H. Arsenault, Editor(s)