Influence of discharge current oscillations on the output power of a waveguide CO laser

An experimental investigation was made of pulse-periodic operation of a waveguide CO laser caused by pulsed modulation of the discharge current and also by reactive oscillations of the current. It was found that the efficiency in the pulse-periodic regime exceeded that in the cw regime by a factor of 1.5 for the same average power. The possibility is discussed of raising the average output power and the efficiency of a waveguide CO laser.