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Single-frequency operation of a cw pumped Nd:YAG laser was achieved by using a ring cavity configuration containing a small differential loss. The resulting unidirectional traveling wave eliminated spatial hole burning, and the output of the laser was at a single frequency.

A high-speed energy correlation technique has been used to measure the time development of the width of the ultrashort pulses generated by a mode-locked Nd+3 glass laser. The laser was simultaneously Q-switched and mode-locked with a saturable absorber and produced a train of approximately 100 ultrashort pulses. It was found that the initial pulses in the train were of the shortest duration and that the pulse width increased from several picoseconds to about 15 picoseconds over the length of the train. The measurement technique and possible mechanisms for this behavior are discussed.

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Microwave sound of discrete frequencies has been generated by the irradiation of a solid with the uniformly spaced, ultrashort optical pulses produced by a mode-locked Nd:glass laser. The sound, rich in harmonic content, has its fundamental frequency fixed by the repetition frequency of the laser pulses. Believed to be thermally generated in the optical skin depth where the energy is absorbed, the sound has been detected at room temperature up to 2 GHz, the tenth harmonic of the fundamental repetition frequency. Such high harmonic content indicates that the acoustic pulses have rise times significantly less than 1 nsec and demonstrates the feasibility of utilizing ultrashort laser pulses to produce ultrashort acoustic pulses.