Abstract

High power visible diode lasers have recently produced cw output powers in excess of 1 W.¹ These devices may be used to create picosecond pulses of high peak power in a number of ways, including gain switching, resonantly driving a sustained oscillation, and mode-locking with an external cavity. We will describe our experimental results, aiming mostly to provide a contrast among the different methods. Self mode-locking, for example, gives a longer pulse over a smaller operating region than an rf driven configuration, but offers a relatively noise-free, inexpensive option for generating visible, 500 psec pulses. A multimode, rate equation theoretical model gives us a quantitative understanding of the laser dynamics, and this work will also be presented.

© 1992 Optical Society of America