Course Title: Laser Physics

BS 8th : PHY-606
MSc 4th : PHY-662
Credit hrs: 3(3-0)

Lecture # 2
Topic:
◻ Transition
◻ Spontaneous Emission
◻ Introduction to Laser
◻ Application of Lasers
 Objectives:
◻ Basics of Laser
◻ How Laser light produced
◻ Inverted Population
 Transition
◻ Since, all transitions are not equally likely.
◻ One reason is that more atoms are in some states than in others.
◻ For example, under normal circumstances, more atoms are in ground state than in
excited levels. Another is that quantum mechanical rules make some transitions
much more likely than others.
◻ That means that an atomic or molecular species will absorb or emit some
wavelengths much more strongly than others.
◻ This effect shows up both in absorption spectra (which shows that wavelengths
the material absorbs when light from another source passes through it) and
emission spectra (the wavelengths the material emits when it is itself de-excited).
 Transition
◻ Electronic transitions can cover a wide range of wavelengths. These occur at
ultraviolet, visible, or infrared wavelengths from 100 nm in the ultraviolet
through to near infrared wavelengths.
◻ The shortest wavelengths come from inner-shell electronic transitions in heavy
elements, which involve much more energy than outer-shell transitions. These
short wavelengths are considered to be X-rays.
Transition
◻ On the other hand, transitions between high lying electronic energy
◻ levels (say, level 18 and 19 of hydrogen) involve very little energy, putting them deep in the
◻ infrared, microwave, or even radio-frequency range. Because these are qualitatively different
◻ than higher-energy transitions of outer electrons, they are put into special class called Rydberg
transitions.
◻ Neither Rydberg transitions nor X-ray emission falls into the optical region, which is a very
◻ small portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, therefore, these are not likely events under
◻ normal laser conditions. Transitions between nuclear energy levels can produce even higher
◻ energy photon, called gamma rays.
 Transition
◻ On the other end of the wavelength spectrum are transitions between vibrational
and rotational energy levels of molecules.
◻ Vibrational transition energies typically correspond to wavelengths of a few to
tens of micrometers; rotational transitions have less energy, typically
corresponding to wavelengths of at least 100 micrometers.
◻ Transitions in two or more types of energy levels can occur simultaneously. For
example, a molecule can undergo a vibrational and rotational transition
simultaneously, with the resulting wavelength close to that of more energetic
vibrational transition.
◻ Many infrared lasers emit families of closely spaced wavelengths on such
vibrational-rotational transitions.
 Transition
◻ Remember in considering transitions that longer wavelengths correspond to
lower energy, and shorter wavelengths correspond to higher energy
◻ (E = hc/λ).
◻ Thus, the energy of a vibrational transition is much larger than that of a
rotational transition, even though the rotational wavelength is much larger.
◻ A combination of a rotational and vibrational transition thus has only slightly
different energy than the original vibrational transition.
 Spontaneous Emission
◻ We know that atoms have well defined energy levels and they can be pushed to the higher energy
states (excited states) by absorption of a photon or by some other means e.g. electric discharge.

◻ Atoms spent some time in the excited state and then decay to the lower energy state. The average time
required to de-exite the 1/e number of atoms from the upper level to the lower level is called lifetime
of the state. This lifetime can be very small e.g. in nanoseconds and up to a few seconds.

◻ Typically, for electronic transitions it is in the order of ten nano-seconds. After spending this period in
the excited state, atoms come down to the lower energy state by emitting a photon.
◻ This emission of photon from an excited atom is called spontaneous emission. This phenomenon one
sees in daily life. Sun, bulb, tubelight and all the fluorescent devices emit photons spontaneously in
the visible region.

◻ These photons are emitted in all the direction and illuminate the whole area, probably, this is the
blessing of spontaneous emission.
 Spontaneous Emission
◻ Spontaneous emission is therefore characterized by the emission of a photon of
energy hν = E2-E1, when the atom decays from level 2 to level 1 (Figure).
◻ Note that radiative emission is just one of the two possible ways for the atom to
decay. The decay can also occur in a nonradiative way.
◻ In this case the energy difference E2-E1 is delivered in some form other than a
photon (e.g., it may go into kinetic energy of the surrounding molecules).
Spontaneous Emission
◻ In spontaneous emission each individual atom acts like a small randomly
oscillating antenna emitting at the transition frequency. Therefore, the
total emission from a collection of spontaneously emitting atoms exhibit
noise-like character
Introduction to LASERS
Conditions of LASERS
References:
Masroor, I. 2008. Lasers and optics. Pakistan institute of engineering and applied
sciences, Islamabad.
Svelto, O. 2009. Principles of Lasers. Springer, 5th Edition.
Silfvast, W. T. (2004). Laser fundamentals. Cambridge university press.

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