Thermal, Spectral and Laser Properties of Er3+:Yb3+:GdMgB₅O10: A New Crystal for 1.5 μm Lasers

Yisheng Huang; Feifei Yuan; Shijia Sun; Zhoubin Lin; Lizhen Zhang

doi:10.3390/ma11010025

Thermal, Spectral and Laser Properties of Er³⁺:Yb³⁺:GdMgB₅O₁₀: A New Crystal for 1.5 μm Lasers

Materials (Basel). 2017 Dec 25;11(1):25. doi: 10.3390/ma11010025.

Authors

Yisheng Huang^{1

2}, Feifei Yuan^{3

4}, Shijia Sun⁵, Zhoubin Lin⁶, Lizhen Zhang⁷

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials Chemistry and Physics, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou 350002, China. hysh@fjirsm.ac.cn.
² University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100039, China. hysh@fjirsm.ac.cn.
³ Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials Chemistry and Physics, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou 350002, China. yuanff@fjirsm.ac.cn.
⁴ University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100039, China. yuanff@fjirsm.ac.cn.
⁵ Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials Chemistry and Physics, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou 350002, China. ssj1027@126.com.
⁶ Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials Chemistry and Physics, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou 350002, China. lzb@fjirsm.ac.cn.
⁷ Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials Chemistry and Physics, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou 350002, China. lzzhang@fjirsm.ac.cn.

Abstract

A novel laser crystal of Er³⁺:Yb³⁺:GdMgB₅O₁₀ with dimension of 26 × 16 × 12 mm³ was grown successfully from K₂Mo₃O₁₀ flux by the top seeded solution growth method. The thermal diffusivity and specific heat capacity were measured to calculate the thermal conductivity of the crystal. The absorption and fluorescence properties of the crystal at room temperature were investigated in detail. The Judd-Ofelt method was used to analyze the polarized absorption spectra. The emission cross-section of the ⁴I_13/2→⁴I_15/2 transition was calculated by the Füchtbauer-Ladenburg formula and the relevant gain cross-sections were estimated. Continuous-wave laser output of 140 mW at 1569 nm with the slope efficiency of 17.8% was demonstrated in a plano-concave resonator. The results reveal that Er³⁺:Yb³⁺:GdMgB₅O₁₀ crystal is a promising material for 1.5 μm lasers.

Keywords: erbium ion; laser materials; lasers; optical spectroscopy.