Efficient Ho:YAP laser dual end-pumped by a laser diode at 1.91 µm in a wing-pumping scheme

We demonstrated a first continuous-wave and acousto-optical Q-switched Ho:YAP laser pumped by fiber-coupled laser diode at 1.91 µm. With a dual-end wing-pumping scheme, a maximum continuous-wave output power of 10.5 W at 2.1 µm and a slope efficiency of 53.2% were obtained when the incident LD power was 25.6 W, while diode-to-Ho conversion efficiency reached up to 41.0%. The Q-switched Ho:YAP laser was investigated for different pulse repetition frequencies from 3 to 20 kHz. The maximum average output power of 9.8 W and maximum pulse energy of 2.7 mJ were achieved at pulse repetition frequencies of 20 and 3 kHz, respectively. In addition, we demonstrated an efficient mid-infrared laser based on a diode-Ho-ZGP architecture for the first time. With a pulse repetition frequency of 3 kHz and an incident Ho pump power of 8.2 W, the average output power of 4.8 W and slope efficiency of 61.0% were reached in mid-infrared ZGP-OPO.