Suppression of self-focusing in neodymium-glass laser systems using repeaters

An analytic investigation is made of the suppression of small-scale self-focusing using optical repeaters. It is found that repeaters effectively limit the growth of small-scale perturbations when certain conditions are imposed on their geometric dimensions and breakup integral in nonlinear elements. It is demonstrated experimentally that repeaters can appreciably improve the radiation brightness at the output from a neodymium-glass amplifying system of subnanosecond pulse duration.