Influence of thermal self-interaction of optical beams on wavefront reversal in the free-running regime

An example of a parallel four-beam interaction in absorbing liquids was used to study the influence of a thermal self-interaction of optical beams on wavefront reversal (WFR) of radiation from a neodymium glass laser having a pulse duration of 2.5–3 msec in the free-running regime. It was found that although the thermal self-interaction substantially rearranged the angular spectrum of the interacting beams, the WFR quality was high due to self-compensation of large-scale optical inhomogeneities in the nonlinear medium. However, some shortening of the duration and deterioration in the efficiency of the WFR process were observed.