High power and efficient operation of a Ho:Y₂O₃ ceramic laser with over 210 W of output power at 2.1 µm

Abstract

We report on power scaling and efficient operation of a Ho:Y2O3 ceramic laser at 2.1 µm in-band pumped with an incoherently beam combined high power and narrow-linewidth Tm fiber source at 1931.2 nm. The 0.5 at.% Ho3+ doped Ho:Y2O3 ceramic is fabricated in-house with scattering loss of < 0.25% cm−1. Up to 210.5 W of continuous-wave output power has been generated at 2117 nm for 366 W absorbed pump power shaped with a one-dimensional top-hat profile, corresponding to a slope efficiency of 60.0% with respect to the absorbed pump power. A slope efficiency of 67.5% has been demonstrated with 160 W of output power using a circular beam pump configuration. Results presented in this work verify the superior power scaling capability of a Ho:Y2O3 ceramic laser with high efficiency at ∼2.1 µm.