An efficient 14.5 W diamond Raman laser at high pulse repetition rate with first (1240 nm) and second (1485 nm) Stokes output

Efficient operation of a pulsed diamond Raman laser at output powers up to 14.5 W is reported. An external-cavity Raman resonator 2.5 cm long employing a low-loss CVD diamond 9.5 mm long generated first (1240 nm) and second (1485 nm) Stokes output powers of up to 3 W and 13 W respectively when pumped with a 30 W q-switched Nd:YVO4 laser with approximately 22 ns pulses at a 36.5 kHz pulse repetition frequency. We show that this approach to efficient wavelength conversion is promising for a range of practical pulsed laser systems with high average power at first and cascaded Stokes orders in the near-infrared and including eye-safe laser output. (letter)