<title>Near-resonant effects on laser pulse propagation in atomic laser isotope separation</title>

Abstract

A computer simulation code to treat atomic excitation and laser beam propagation simultaneously in an atomic laser isotope separation system has been developed. The three-level Bloch-Maxwell equations are solved numerically to analyze the change of pulse shapes, the modification of laser frequencies and the time-varying atomic populations. The near-resonant effects on the propagation of frequency chirped and non-chirped laser pulses have been analyzed. It was found that there are serious differences in pulse shapes, frequency modifications and propagation velocities between laser pulses with and without chirping.