Waveguide CO laser with a wide tuning range of the emission frequency

An investigation was made of a cw waveguide CO laser with a selective resonator without circulation or water cooling. Diffraction gratings with 300 and 150 lines/mm were used as selectors. Lasing was observed due to 40 vibrational–rotational transitions in the CO molecule with an output power of 0.02–0.08 W for the strongest lines. The maximum range of continuous tuning of the emission frequency was 420 MHz for the P(17) transition in the 10–9 vibrational band.