Recovery techniques for saturated masers

The practical applicability of Masers is often hindered by saturation effects of the maser material. Any strong signal of the same frequency as the maser signal frequency will cause saturation, thus paralyzing the maser for a period of time which is often too long for the intended application. These difficulties have been overcome by desaturating a four-level ruby maser immediately after the maser has been saturated. The experiment was carried out at a signal frequency of 2.5 KMc using an X-band pump. Full recovery of the amplification capabilities of the maser was achieved.