Abstract

A free-electron laser (FEL) has been constructed at AT&T Bell Laboratories, and some preliminary testing of the apparatus has been completed. The principal components of the FEL (designed in collaboration with C. K. N. Patel) are an energy tunable (10–20-MeV) microtron accelerator and a 20-cm, 500-G, 10-m long helical electromagnet. This system has the potential of providing a mode-locked laser output continuously tunable from 100 to 400 μm with peak powers of several hundred kilowatts, cw powers of several watts, and pulse durations of the order of 10⁻¹¹ sec. A laboratory has been constructed to house this source and to facilitate linear and nonlinear time-resolved spectroscopic studies of solid-state excitations and other far-IR spectroscopic chemical applications. In addition, a bright positron source is being constructed at the FEL beam dump by A, Mills of AT&T Bell Laboratories. We will report on the progress and results of this research program. (12 min)

© 1984 Optical Society of America