Thermally bonded Yb : YAG planar waveguide laser

Laser performance of a diode-bar side-pumped Yb:YAG planar multimode wavegu ide geometry is reported. The waveguide was fabricated by thermal bonding t echnique with a 100-mu m thick and 3-mm long active layer. This configurati on offers an excellent confinement of the pump fields. By using an astigmat ic resonator, a large overlap of pump and signal fields combined with a goo d beam quality have been realized. The M-2 values were found to be 1.5 and 4 in the vertical and horizontal directions, respectively. A maximum CW out put power of 1.2 W at 1032 nm has been obtained. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.