Molybdenum Disulfide Film Saturable Absorber Based on Sol-Gel Glass and Spin Coating Used in High Power Q-switched Nd:YAG Laser.

In recent years, many different kinds of nonlinear optical materials have been applied to passively Q-switched solid-state lasers. However, the average output powers of these lasers are typically limited to than one Watt due to low damage threshold of the materials. In this study, a molybdenum-disulfide-doped glass-composite absorber was synthesized using the sol-gel method and spin coating technique. The optical damage threshold of the absorber reached 3.17 J/cm2. Saturation intensity, modulation depth, and non-saturable loss are 9.35 MW/cm2, 8.41%, and 9.14%, respectively. After inserting the absorber into a linear Nd:YAG laser cavity. Maximum average output-power (3.22 W) and stable Q-switched laser pulses duration (132 ns) are obtained.