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Neodymium Doped Yttrium Aluminum Garnet (Nd:YAG)

Neodymium-doped yttrium aluminum garnet (Nd:YAG) has been widely used as a solid state laser host material. It is a stable compound, mechanically strong but brittle, optically isotropic, and chemically stable in most acids including nitric acid (HNO3) and hydrofluoric acid (HF). Its good fluorescent lifetime, thermal conductivity and physical strengths make it suitable for high power lamp pumped laser. Nd:YAG can be grown by CZ method with very low strain. The YAG host is transparent from below 300 nm to beyond 4 microns, and accepts trivalent laser activator ions (Y3+).

Extinction Ratio:  

Strain and other imperfections in the Nd:YAG induce local birefringence and inhomogeneity, cause wavefront distortion, and change polarization states. Extinction ratio is a simple method to quantify the residual birefringence and inhomogeneity in a laser rod. The extinction ratio is measured by using a HeNe laser source with a laser rod sandwiched between two polarizers. The extinction ratio is defined as 10*log (T1/T2), where T1 is the maximum transmitted beam intensity with the polarizers uncrossed, and T2 is the minimum beam intensity with the polarizers crossed.

 

  Crystal Structure Cubic
 
  lattice constant (Å) 12.01
 
  Concentration (cm-3)
≈ 1.2×1020
 
  Absorption Coefficient (/cm) α<0.003  at 1064nm
  Primary Pump Wavelength (nm) 808
  Primary Pump Wavelength bandwidth (nm) 0.6
  Fluorescence Lifetime (us)(Nd:1.0%) 230
  Stimulated Emission Cross Section (cm2) 2.8×10-19
  Lasing Wavelength (nm) 1064
  Polarized Emission Unpolarized
 
  Melting Point (°C) 1970
 
  Linear Coefficient of Thermal Expansion (0°C~250°C)  ( /K)
[111]: 7.8X10-6
[110]: 7.7X10-6
[100]: 8.2X10-6
 
  Thermal Conductivity (W/mK)(20°C)
14
 
  Refractive Indices n = 1.9278 at 266nm
  n = 1.8368 at 532nm
  n = 1.8169 at 1064nm
 
  Mohs Hardness 8.5
 
  Density (g/cm^3) 4.56
 
  Young's Modulus (GPa) 282
 
  Poisson's Ratio 0.28
 
  Table 1: Nd:YAG Properties (1.0%Nd)
 

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