Propriétés spatiales et temporelles des résonateurs lasers munis de miroirs à conjugaison de phase

Abstract

The properties of laser resonators with one phase-conjugate mirror are reviewed. All these resonators are geometrically stable; their resonant frequencies are determined by the frequencies of the pump waves, while the spacing between the satellite resonant frequencies is fixed by the cavity length. Their diffraction losses are higher on the phase-conjugate mirror than on the conventional mirror. Phase-conjugate resonators are less sensitive to intracavity aberrations than conventional resonators. They can be used for short-pulse compression when the phase-conjugate mirror is produced by degenerate four-wave mixing in a nonlinear medium with pump waves consisting of mode-locked pulse trains. [Translated by the journal]