Knife-edge diffraction as one of the methods of coupling vacuum ultraviolet radiation out of a nontransmitting laser resonator

It is suggested that far vacuum ultraviolet radiation can be coupled out of a laser resonator by diffraction on a sharp ("knife") edge of a mirror covering part of a beam. It is reported that a model experiment carried out on a neodymium laser shows that a considerable fraction of the energy can be coupled out in this way.