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 1 W due to the 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 nonsaturable loss are 9.35 MW/cm2, 8.41%, and 9.14%, respectively. After inserting the absorber into a linear Nd:YAG laser cavity, the maximum average output power (3.22 W) and stable Q-switched laser pulses duration (132 ns) were obtained.