Recent Advances in Infrared Lasers and Applications

A special issue of Photonics (ISSN 2304-6732). This special issue belongs to the section "Lasers, Light Sources and Sensors".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 July 2025 | Viewed by 2018

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Guest Editor
National Key Laboratory of Laser Spatial Information, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin 150001, China
Interests: middle-infrared optical materials; nonlinear optical frequency conversion; solid-state laser technology
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Amongst the numerous lasers sources, infrared (IR) lasers are well developed for a plethora of applications, such as material processing, spectroscopy, displays, medicine, remote sensing, and strong-field physics. Research on IR lasers has achieved significant improvements in output power, pulse energy, wavelength range, pulse width, etc. Moreover, this work has promoted the development of related technical applications.

This Special Issue of Photonics will focus on the most recent advances in IR lasers and their applications. It will bring together the latest developments in novel IR laser materials and IR laser design, and improvements in output performance and the application of IR technology. We welcome the submission of the latest original research as well as forward-looking review papers to this Special Issue.

Best wishes,

Prof. Dr. Xiaoming Duan
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • solid-state lasers
  • laser materials
  • fiber lasers
  • semiconductor lasers
  • nonlinear optical frequency conversion
  • laser design
  • thermal management of lasers
  • narrow-linewidth IR lasers
  • Q-switched IR lasers
  • ultra-fast IR lasers
  • multiwavelength IR lasers
  • applications of IR lasers

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Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

13 pages, 6651 KiB  
Article
Research on Metal Mesh Coupling Mirrors Utilizing Metasurfaces for Optically Pumped Gas THz Lasers
by Lijie Geng, Zhenxiang Fu, Shuaifei Song, Chenglong Bi, Wenyan Zhang, Ruiliang Zhang, Kun Yang and Yanchen Qu
Photonics 2025, 12(7), 642; https://doi.org/10.3390/photonics12070642 - 24 Jun 2025
Viewed by 136
Abstract
Optically pumped gas terahertz (THz) lasers (OPGTLs) as reliable sources of THz radiation have been extensively utilized within THz application areas. In this paper, a substrate-free metal mesh coupler based on the metasurfaces principle was designed for continuous wave OPGTL, which is suitable [...] Read more.
Optically pumped gas terahertz (THz) lasers (OPGTLs) as reliable sources of THz radiation have been extensively utilized within THz application areas. In this paper, a substrate-free metal mesh coupler based on the metasurfaces principle was designed for continuous wave OPGTL, which is suitable for the Fabry–Perot (FP) THz resonator. The parameters of substrate-free metal mesh are calculated by the Ulrich equivalent circuit model, and the influence of metal mesh period and linewidth on its transmittance is analyzed quantitatively. Taking the THz laser with the 118.8 µm of CH3OH optically pumped by the 9.6 µm CO2 laser line for instance, two kinds of metal mesh were devised as input and output couplers of the resonator, and the transmittance and reflectance of the metal meshes are verified by the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method. Furthermore, the transmitted and reflected light fields of the FP resonant cavity metal mesh mirrors were simulated by using the FDTD method under the vertical incidence of both pump light and THz waves. Validation of the optical field characteristics of the substrate-free metal meshes confirmed their suitability as ideal input and output coupling cavity mirrors for FP resonant cavities in optically pumped gas THz lasers. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in Infrared Lasers and Applications)
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13 pages, 5706 KiB  
Article
High-Repetition-Rate Targets for Plasma Mirror FROG on Chirped Picosecond Pulses
by Ștefan Popa, Andrei Nazîru, Ana-Maria Lupu, Dan Gh. Matei, Alice Dumitru, Cristian Alexe, Ioan Dăncuş, Claudiu A. Stan and Daniel Ursescu
Photonics 2025, 12(6), 533; https://doi.org/10.3390/photonics12060533 - 24 May 2025
Viewed by 348
Abstract
High-repetition-rate targets present an opportunity for developing diagnostic tools for on-demand calibration at high-power laser facilities for consistent performance and reproducibility during experimental campaigns. The non-linear change in transmission associated with a laser-driven plasma mirror, based on high-repetition rate targets, has been used [...] Read more.
High-repetition-rate targets present an opportunity for developing diagnostic tools for on-demand calibration at high-power laser facilities for consistent performance and reproducibility during experimental campaigns. The non-linear change in transmission associated with a laser-driven plasma mirror, based on high-repetition rate targets, has been used in a Frequency Resolved Optical Gating (FROG) configuration to analyze the spectral phase for near-infrared pulses far from the Fourier limit. Three types of targets were compared for characterizing pulses in the 1–8 ps range: a glass slide, a polymer tape, and a thin liquid sheet created by two impinging micrometer-scale jets. The thin liquid film had the best mechanical stability and introduced the least spectral distortion, allowing the most robust reconstruction of the temporal intensity profile. The spectral phase was reconstructed using a non-iterative algorithm, which reproduced the second-order phase distortions induced with an acousto-optic programmable dispersive filter with an RMS error of 6.2%, leading to measured pulse durations with an RMS deviation ranging from 1% for pulses of 6.8–7.8 ps up to 7.5% for pulses around 1 ps. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in Infrared Lasers and Applications)
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9 pages, 5100 KiB  
Article
High-Power KTiOAsO4 Optical Parametric Oscillator at 300 Hz
by Tao Li, Jun Meng, Gaoyou Liu and Zhaojun Liu
Photonics 2025, 12(3), 270; https://doi.org/10.3390/photonics12030270 - 15 Mar 2025
Viewed by 575
Abstract
A high-power and high-repetition KTiOAsO4 (KTA) optical parametric oscillator (OPO) was established in this study, with the adoption of plane-parallel and ring cavities. The pump was a high-power Nd:YAG master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) system with a pulse repetition frequency (PRF) of [...] Read more.
A high-power and high-repetition KTiOAsO4 (KTA) optical parametric oscillator (OPO) was established in this study, with the adoption of plane-parallel and ring cavities. The pump was a high-power Nd:YAG master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) system with a pulse repetition frequency (PRF) of 300 Hz, and the corresponding beam quality factors were Mx2 = 3.4 and My2 = 3.2. In the plane-parallel cavity experiment, powers of 51.1 W (170 mJ) and 15.9 W (53 mJ) in the signal and idler were obtained, respectively. In terms of the average power of 1 μm of a pumped KTA OPO, to our knowledge, this is the highest average power for KTA OPO. The ring cavity was constructed to achieve lasers with both high power and beam quality. The output powers of the ring cavities for the signal and idler were 33.9 W (113 mJ) and 8.7 W (29 mJ), respectively, and the corresponding beam quality factors of the signal were Mx2 = 5.3 and My2 = 7.9. The 300 Hz 100 mJ class 1.54 μm laser with a beam quality factor of less than 10 is an ideal eye-safe light detection and ranging (LiDAR) source. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in Infrared Lasers and Applications)
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12 pages, 4649 KiB  
Article
Experimental Study of an Efficient, High Power and Tunable Continuous-Wave CO2 Laser
by Lijie Geng, Shuaifei Song, Kun Yang, Pengji Yan, Zhenxiang Fu, Yanchen Qu, Ruiliang Zhang and Zhifeng Zhang
Photonics 2025, 12(3), 188; https://doi.org/10.3390/photonics12030188 - 24 Feb 2025
Viewed by 553
Abstract
The tunable CO2 laser is a common pump source for optically pumped terahertz lasers. In this paper, based on a sealed-off CO2 laser tube and a grating-tuned cavity, we reported an efficient, high-power, low-cost, simple structure and tunable continuous-wave CO2 [...] Read more.
The tunable CO2 laser is a common pump source for optically pumped terahertz lasers. In this paper, based on a sealed-off CO2 laser tube and a grating-tuned cavity, we reported an efficient, high-power, low-cost, simple structure and tunable continuous-wave CO2 laser. A sealed-off CO2 laser tube was designed and customized, and its plasma discharge characteristics were experimentally analyzed. The influence of output coupler transmittance and discharge current on the laser’s tunability and output power was systematically studied using grating tuning. A total of 78 spectral lines were achieved within the wavelength range of 9.17–10.86 μm. The maximum output power of 55.5 W was recorded on the 10P20 line when the output coupler transmittance was approximately 22%. The laser exhibited a beam spot radius of about 3.8 mm and a beam quality factor (M2) of 1.74. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Advances in Infrared Lasers and Applications)
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