Room-temperature cw operation of an efficient miniaturized Nd:YAG laser end-pumped by a superluminescent diode

Abstract
A miniaturized Nd:YAG laser is described, in which a 3‐mm‐diam×5.4‐mm‐long laser rod is end‐pumped by a single AlxGa1−xAs superluminescent diode (SLD) having 20‐μm×1.4‐nm stripe geometry. A 4.5‐mW laser power was obtained at room temperature in a 1‐ms pulse operation. Emitted power from the SLD was 50 mW with 1.7% external power efficiency. When continuously pumped, a 1.5‐mW laser power was obtained at room temperature.