Excitation of copper halide and strontium-ion recombination lasers using a pulsed microwave source

We have demonstrated the feasibility of microwave excitation of copper and strontium vapour lasers, however the performances of both lasers was below that of conventional DC excited lasers. In the case of the copper bromide laser, although low specific pulse energies were obtained the effective specific pulse energies were comparable to conventional high pulse recurrence rate (PRF) copper halide lasers (CHLs). A major limitation to the output of the device was the fact that the vapour pressure of the copper halide could not be controlled independently of the power absorbed in the plasma. Nevertheless, there is no fundamental reason to suggest that the performance of a small bore (less than around 1 cm in diameter) microwave excited CHL should be worse than that of a conventional electrically excited CHL