Parametric excitation of relaxation oscillations at the subharmonic of the external modulating signal in a ring Nd : YAG laser

The dynamics of solid-state ring laser (SSRL) radiation with periodic pump modulation is studied experimentally and simulated numerically in the case of parametric excitation of relaxation oscillations at the subharmonic of a modulating signal. Parametric processes are investigated by modulating the pump in two regimes of the SSRL operation: steady-state regime of unidirectional lasing and self-modulation regime of the first kind. Significant differences in the dynamics of radiation for these regimes are found. It is established that when the laser operates in the self-modulation regime, a first-order parametric instability can result in the appearance of the dynamic chaos regime.