A Compact, Solid State UV Laser

A compact, high power pulse UV laser would find many immediate applications in a variety of fields including bio-sensing. high-density data storage, printing, photolithography, remote sensing and detection of explosive materials. In response to this need, CoreTek, Inc. proposes to develop and commercialize a compact, diode-pumped, micro-cavity UV laser to generate an optical pulse train of sub-nanosecond, high peak power optical pulses at 266 and 355 nm. The advantage of the proposed design over existingr UV laser systems is the reduction in the number of optical components, volume (factor 50), pump power (factor of 2) and cost (factor of 3) . The realized laser head would occupy a volume of less than 100 cm2 and would consist of a passively Q-switched microcavity laser assembly, to be optically pumped by a fiber or lens coupled, high power laser diode. Since efficient high-power laser diodes would be used as an optical pump source, a battery operated UV laser would be possible for the first time. A compact and inexpensive source of UV radiation would find ready use in applications related to high-density data storage, printing, photolithography, remote sensing and detection of explosive materials and biological agents.