4.

5 TYPES OF LASER
in a digital communications.
Now days different kinds of lasers are available, the most common being
a
house now has at least one -in their CD/DVD players
and recorders. Some lasers can change
Virtually every infrared to the ultraviolet regions.
from the
colour--they are called tunable lasers. The lasers now operate are available in the
lasers being developed using electron accelerators. The lasers now
Moreover, X-ray are
semiconductor lasers, etc.
wide range viz, solid lasers, liquid lasers, gas lasers,

4.5.1. Ruby Laser: Solid State Laser consists of

Ruby laser is a solid state laser, which
Partially three main parts (i) working material (ii) optical
Silvered
vered
Xenon Flash Light Tube resonant cavity and (11) excitation
source.
Face (B)
Fully
Silvered AAA Working Material Ruby laser is made up
of a
Face PWLaser crystal of ruby in the form of cylindrical
rod having
(A) Beam diameter
size 2 to 30cm in length and 0.5 to 2cm in
the end is
whose both ends are optically flat. One of
VVV fully silvered and other is partially silvered,
so that

they can acl as fully and partially reflecting surfaces,a

rod is
Power Supply respectively, as shown in Fig. 4.9. Ruby
crystal ofAL,O, in which chromium oxide is mixed'
as impurity so that some of
the AI* ions are replaced
Inlet Outlet chromium ions give
by Cr'ions. These 'impurity'
Cooling Fluid (Liquid Nitrogen) rise to the laser action.
and B is known
Fig. 4.9 The space between the two faces A
as the resonant cavity, in
which the light (photon)
rod is wound by
be built by multiple reflections and through stimulated emission. The ruby
intensity can up
a helical xenon flash light tube
with an excitatiøn souree in the form of a power supply.
 4.8 Engineering P'hysies

orking Principle of Ruby Laser In this laser, chromium ions are active centres which arc responsible
TOr the laser transition. A simplified energy level diagram of chromium ions in ruby crystal is shown in Fig.
In
.0 the nomal state, most of the chromium ions are the ground state E, When light from the flash tube
in
of wavclength 3500A is made to fall upon the ruby rod, these incident photons are absorbed by the chromium
n s that risc to the excited state E,. Then they give a part of their energy to the crystal structure and reach

ne metastable state, i.e. the E, state. These ions in metastable state can remain for a longerduration 10 sec.
heretore, the number of ions in this state goes on increasing while at the same time number of ions in ground

State goes on decreasing duc to the optical pumping. Thus, the population inversion is established between
the metastable state and the
ground state.

E Short-live state 10

Radiation-tess Transition
Optical
Pumping
E Metastable state103
6943 A
5500 A W
wW Spontaneous 6943A
Emission M
6943 A
W
E Ground state

Fig.Fig. 4.10

When an excited ion passes spontaneously from the metastable state to the ground state, it emits a photon of
wavelength 6943A. This photon travels parallel to the axis of ruby rod and stimulates the surrounding ions
present in the metastable state. Then by stimulated emission other photons are emitted, which are in the phase
with the stimulating photons. By successive reflections of these photons at the ends of the rod, every time the
stimulated emission is achieved and we obtain an intense, coherent and unidirectional laser beam from the
partially silvered face B.
The ruby laser operates at about 1% efficiency. It may produce a laser beam of I mm to 25 mm in diameter.
The beam obtained is in the form of pulses. However, on the advantage side, very strong beam as strong as
10,000 W in power is produced. Furthermore, the construction of this laser is simple and the operationis
practical laser. Other examples of solid state lasers are
very easy. For this reason, this laser is also known as

Neodynium-YAG (Nd-YAG), Neodynium-Glass (Nd-Glass) and semiconductor lasers.

this drawback, the gas
As we know that the output beam of the ruby laser is not continuous. To overcome
tube having the
filled laser was made by A. Javan, W. Bennett and D. Herriott in 1961. It consists of a quartz
tube are sealed by optically
SIze about 1.5 cm in diameter and about 1 meter in length. The both ends ofthe
and the other one is fully
plane and parallel mirrors, one of them being partially silvered (90% reflective)
silvered (100% reflective).