Open AccessCompact low-voltage electro-optic Q-switch made of LiNbO3
Author(s) -
Jifang Shang,
Jinfeng Yang,
Haoshan Hao,
Qinglian Li,
Ling Zhang,
Jian Sun
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
optics express
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.394
H-Index - 271
ISSN - 1094-4087
DOI - 10.1364/oe.393958
Subject(s) - pockels effect , lithium niobate , optics , materials science , laser , voltage , q switching , electro optics , crystal (programming language) , optoelectronics , physics , programming language , quantum mechanics , computer science
This work presents a compact LiNbO 3 (lithium niobate, LN) electro-optic (EO) Q-switch with a lower driving voltage than the conventional LN Q-switches. By using non-direct cuts of a certain crystallographic orientation, a LN crystal is used both as a quarter-wave plate (QWP) and a pockels cell in a laser cavity. Through theoretical calculations and experiments, we have determined the optimized crystal orientations with low quarter-wave voltages (QWV). A set of compact LN EO Q-switches were prepared and used successfully in the pulse-on mode in a Nd:YAG laser. The Q-switched laser outputs are comparable to those obtained by using a conventional Z-cut LN Q-switch with a QWP. The QWV of the Q-switch with the optimized crystal orientation is 600V lower than that of the Z-cut LN Q-switch.