Characteristics of doubling circuits used in gas laser excitation

The electrical characteristics of a doubling circuit (or LC-inversion circuit) used to excite a TEA N2 laser have been studied and a theoretical model is proposed for the voltage and current oscillations in the circuit, assuming that the resistance of the discharge remains constant. The theoretical predictions are in excellent agreement with the experimental data and thus, the shape of the voltage and current waveforms in doubling circuits can be predicted from the circuit parameters. With this method, the nonmeasurable quantities of inductance and resistance of the laser gas discharge and their dependence on the electrode gap can be revealed. The theoretical treatment described in this paper can be easily applied to any type of gas laser using doubling-circuit excitation, such as excimer lasers