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5 Dye Lasers 191
undergoes three single passes inside the EOM) prior to illumination of
the AOM, At the EOM a voltage is applied to change the phase of the
radiation. A frequency shift is induced when the voltage changes as a
function of time. Voltage limitations restrict the time over which the fre-
quency shift can be sustained. Thus the function of the slower AOM is to
relieve the EOM soon after a pertubation. The EOM used by Hall and
Hansch is an AD*P crystal. in a triple-pass configuration, and their AOM
used TeO,. -
Further frequency stabilization methods use molecular media, such as
iodine. to provide frequency reference [95]. Performance of frequency-stabilized
cw dye lasers is tabulated in Table 13.
5. FEMTOSECOND-PULSE DYE LASERS
The dye laser with its continuous and wide frequency gain profile is an
inherent source of ultrashort temporal pulses. Indeed. the development of
femtosecond-pulsed dye lasers has been essential to the development and
advancement of ultrashort-pulse laser science. An excellent review on this sub-
ject. including a historical perspective. is given by Diels 1871. In this section the
performance of femtosecond-pulsed dye lasers is presented together with a
description of technical elements relevant to the technology of ultrashort-pulse
laser emission.
For a comprehensive discussion on ultrashort-pulse-measuring techniques
the reader should refer to Diels [87]. Also, for alternative methods of ultrashort-
pulse generation utilizing distributed feedback dye laser configurations, the
review given by Schafer [98] is suggested.
The principles and theory of femtosecond-pulse generation has been dis-
cussed by many authors [99-1091. Notable among these works are the papers by
Zhakarol. and Shabat [99]. Diels et 01. [loo], and Salin et a!. [loll, which discuss
nonlinear effects and the subject of solitons. Pulse evolution is discussed by New
[102]. An important contribution of general interest is that of Penzkofer and
Baumler [10131. This comprehensive work includes excitation parameters and cross
sections relevant EO the saturable absorber DODCI and the gain dye rhodamine 6G.
5.1 Femtosecond-Pulse Dye Laser Cavities
Mode locking in dye lasers using an intracavity saturable absorber dye cell
was first demonstrated in a flashlamp-pumped dye laser [ 1101. This development
was followed by the demonstration of passive mode locking in a linear cw dye
laser [ 11 I].
A development of crucial importance to the generation of ulti-ashort pulses
was the introduction of the concept of colliding-pulse mode locking (CPM) by