30-THZ UP-CONVERSION OF AN ALGAAS DIODE-LASER WITH AGGAS2 - BRIDGING THE SEVERAL-TERAHERTZ FREQUENCY GAP IN THE NEAR-INFRARED

We report as much as 6-mu W upconverted cw radiation at lambda = 778 n m from the sum-frequency mixing of a 50-mW diode laser at lambda = 842 nm and a 200-mW CO2 laser at lambda = 10.2 mu m by use of a 15-mm-lon g silver This nonlinear material provides a convenient connection betw een IR and visible/near-IR We describe simple frequency chains based o n this upconversion process that permit the absolute frequency measure ment of many visible or near-IR possible standards at the 10(-12) accu racy level. Transposition of terahertz-scale frequency-difference meas urements from the near IR to the 10-mu m domain is also proposed. (C) 1996 Optical Society of America