The
nitrogen laser uses nitrogen as the lasing
medium. The laser consists of a
chamber
filed with nitrogen at near
atmospheric pressure.
It also has two electrodes that form a
spark gap inside.
Unlike most lasers no mirrors is needed due
to the nitrogen's high
gain as a lasing medium, but
one mirror is sometimes used to
increase beam intensity.
M | beam
i |-------|-----------------: ......
r | | :::::::::::::::
r | lasing chamber :::::::::::::::
o | | :::::::::::::::
r |-------|-----------------: ``````
|
Spark
gap
When a 20kV+ electric
pulse is sent over the
gap, the
resulting spark will give off a
pulse of
UV light. This light
stimulates
the nitrogen to send out more UV light, this
forms a nanosecond pulse with UV light(peak
wavelength 337nm). This pulse
typically
has an
effect of up to 100kW, but the beam
is poorly
collimated.
The nitrogen laser can be used to pump a
dye laser
and in other
applications where a UV pulse is needed
, like UV
spectroscopy. Due to its simplicity it
is often the first
project of an
amateur laser builder.