An efficiently initiated pulsed H₂+ F₂laser

Abstract

Output pulse observations are presented for a helium-diluted HF laser pumped by the H <inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</inf> + F <inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</inf> chain reaction. Initiation of the reaction was accomplished with 180 transverse electrical discharges. Addition of a trace of O <inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</inf> to the gas mixture was found to enhance performance. Optimum performance was found with a 120-torr mixture with mole ratio F <inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</inf> :H <inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</inf> :O <inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</inf> :He = 1:0.7:0.08:15 initiated with a 22.5-kV 250-pF discharge; this gave a single-pulse output energy of 0.073 J. This corresponds to a ratio of laser output energy to electrical input energy of 115 percent.