Gasdynamic CO2 laser with gas heating by an electrically induced explosion

A gasdynamic laser is described in which the gas is heated by the discharge of a capacitor bank in a 5 liter chamber. The dependences of the total and specific emitted radiation powers on the pressure and temperature in the discharge chamber were obtained experimentally and by calculation, for pressures up to 70 atm. Numerical simulation of the experimental setup was used to determine the losses associated with vibrational relaxation, heating of the mirrors, and removal of the stored energy by the gas flow. A specific energy output of 20 J/g was obtained by optimizing the parameters. The calculations are in satisfactory agreement with the experiment.