Properties of sol-gel and polymer host for solid-state dye lasers

In this paper, solid-state dye lasers of sol-gel host and polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) host were both prepared, pyrromethene-567 (PM567) was used as laser gain media, and the second harmonic generation (SHG) of Q-switched Nd:YAG laser (532 nm, 20 ns) was used as a pumping source. In sol-gel host, peak wavelength of output laser spectrum was 560 nm, and full width at half maximum (FWHM) of the bandwidth was 9 nm. In polymer host, peak wavelength of output laser spectrum was 561 nm, and the FWHM was 8 nm. The relation of output energy versus input energy was also studied. For the sol-gel and the PMMA host solid-state PM567 lasers, respectively, the slope efficiencies were 43% and 26.3%, and the highest energy outputs in the experiment were 13 mJ and 99 mJ.