Regenerative ring-laser design by use of an intracavity diffractive mode-selecting element

We report what we believe to be the first application of diffractive phase elements for transverse mode selection in laser ring resonators; We show th at this resonator type offers several advantages over Fabry-Perot resonator s with diffractive mirrors. The design for a regenerative ring resonator th at produces an eighth-order super-Gaussian intensity profile beam is presen ted. Numerical simulations, including modeling of the gain saturation and e xperimental tests, have been carried out to demonstrate the performance of this approach for cw and pulsed operations. (C) 1999 Optical Society of Ame rica OCIS codes: 140.3300, 140.3560, 050.1970, 070.5040, 140.3410, 230.5750 .