Modern aspects of far-infrared gas lasers

High-pressure single-mode CO<inline-formula>^{<roman>2</roman>}</inline-formula> laser with picosecond plasma shutter

“…Current applications are, e.g., the test of infrared detectors and the investigation of high-Ta superconductors. 48 The basic concept of OFID, which was first realized by Yablonovitch et al,49 is the following: A smooth CO2 laser pulse is abruptly truncated within 10 ps by a plasma shutter. Due to this fast truncation, large frequency sidebands (as wide as 100 GHz) are generated.…”

Intense narrow band terahertz generation via type-II difference-frequency generation in ZnTe using chirped optical pulses

“…Alternatively, molecular gas lasers pumped by CO 2 lasers are powerful, tabletop sources of continuous-wave ͑cw͒ terahertz radiation. 10 A critical drawback of the gas lasers is their lack of tunability. Their operational frequencies are determined by specific molecular transitions.…”