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We have built a diode-laser-pumped Nd:YAG slab laser that emits 40 W of cw power in a TEM 00 mode and 72 W of power in multimode operation when pumped with 235 W. The slope efficiencies are 22% for TEM 00-mode operation and 36% for multimode operation. The laser uses a zigzag slab geometry to reduce thermally induced distortions and operates at less than one wave of distortion at the full pump power. A significant advantage of our design over those of previous slab lasers is a new Teflon AF protective coating on the slab total-internal-reflection surfaces, which greatly simplifies the mounting and cooling of the slab laser medium.

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The self-consistent integral equation for the field distribution of the resonant modes in a resonator with a tilted retroreflecting corner cube mirror is solved. The corner cube acts like a convex lens with radius of curvature -L cot(2)theta in the rotation direction (L is the cavity length and theta the rotation angle) and like a flat plane in the direction of the rotation axis. The field distribution can be described in terms of Hermite-Gaussian functions, and these results have been confirmed experimentally using an Ar-ion laser. The equivalent beam matrix for a reflecting corner cube is also found.

The Judd–Ofelt analysis has been applied to the sigma-polarized absorption spectrum of Nd3+:NaB″alumina to determine the modified Judd–Ofelt parameters Ωσ,2, Ωσ,4, and Ωσ,6. A model for the near-neighbor environment of Nd3+ has been proposed and tested using a simplified point charge model for the crystal field. The model indicates that the observed spectrum may be explained by a large linear field term in the crystal field induced by the shift in position of conduction plane oxygen and neodymium ions away from sites of inversion symmetry.