Excitation of metal vapor lasers by pulse trains

Stimulated emission as a result of transitions in metal atoms was excited by trains of short (~10^–7 sec) electric current pulses with a variable off-duty factor. This method was applied to a copper chloride vapor laser and it made it possible to maintain a steady temperature (to within ±5°) in a laser tube for a long time (over 2 h) when the repetition frequency of the excitation pulses in a train was varied from 8 to 50 kHz. Moreover, this method made it possible to use low-power sources in achieving stable stimulated emission from such lasers and to predict the operating conditions in lasers with a moderate output power, as well as to investigate the processes occurring in a laser medium more simply and conveniently than by the two-pulse methods.