LABORATORY
METAL VAPOR LASERS

HEAD: Prof. Nikola Sabotinov, Dr.Sci.
tel./fax: (+359 2) 8756 009; e-mail: n.sabotinov@issp.bas.bg

TOTAL STAFF: 14
RESEARCH SCIENTISTS: 12

Nikolay Kirilov Vuchkov, Dr.Sci.
Peter Karolev Telbizov, Ph.D.
Dimo Nikolov Astadjov, Ph.D.
Margarita Georgieva Grozeva, Ph.D.
Todor Stefanov Petrov, Ph.D.
Krassimir Angelov Temelkov, Ph.D.
Krassimir Dimitrov Dimitrov
Vesselina Dimitrova Gentcheva, Ph.D.
Nikolay Ivanov Minkovski, Ph.D.
Nikolay Vitanov Vitanov, Ph.D.
Peter Vassilev Zahariev, Ph.D.
Ivailo Ivanov Balchev, Ph.D. student
Diana B. Michailova, Ph.D. student
Blagovela G. Blagoeva
Georgi Dimitrov Toshev
Ivan Stoyanov Radkov

RESEARCH ACTIVITIES:

    International and national scientific projects
    In 2003 the scientific team at the Laboratory of Metal Vapor Lasers worked on totally seven research projects, as follows: two international projects with additional funding from the NATO Programme Science for Peace and the European Union - the 5^th Framework Programme, respectively; three international research projects under agreements for Academies and Institutes cooperation; one project with the National Council for Scientific Research at the Ministry of Education of Bulgaria and one project with a Bulgarian industrial company.
    In 2003 the Final Report on the Project NATO SfP-972685 "NATO SfP-Copper Bromide Laser" was published. This project entitled "Development of a system based on a high power and high efficiency copper bromide laser for precision materials processing" has been recognized as one of the three best Bulgarian projects in the Programme Science for Peace of NATO.

    Scientific activities abroad
    In 2003 scientists from the Laboratory of Metal Vapor Lasers went abroad in pursuance of scientific tasks as follows: for research training - 3, for long-term scientific investigations and/or for giving lectures - 2; on organization and administrative missions - 2.

Scientific achievements:

Deep-ultraviolet copper ion laser
In 2003 investigations on a copper ion laser lasing in the deep ultraviolet continued. A new laser tube construction for UV Cu+ Ne-CuBr laser was developed with a discharge channel of the ceramic material Al₂O₃. Lifetime investigations were carried out for the discharge tube under a stabilized temperature regime in the active zone. The gain contour for the UV laser line 248 nm was determined. In a multimode regime of laser generation was measured the laser beam deviation for different laser resonator configurations.

Longitudinal discharge in a segmented hollow cathode
The efficiency of discharge excitation under the conditions of a longitudinal discharge in a segmented hollow cathode was studied. Axial emission intensities of helium, copper and argon atom and ion lines were measured under the discharge conditions typical to laser generation. The effect of the cathode segment length on the spectral line intensity was determined.

Coherent interaction of laser radiation with atoms and molecules
Investigations of coherent interaction of laser radiation with atoms and molecules were continued. A small broadening in spectral lines under pulsed laser excitation has been proved experimentally. A theoretical model of coherent excitation of a molecular beam and of interaction of a two-degenerate-levels system with a laser pulsed field of random polarization has been developed. On the base of a theoretical model, a method for the creation of super-rotors (molecules in a highly excited rotational state), was suggested.

Copper Vapor Laser
Divergence-evolution studies were carried out for the lines 511 nm and 578 nm in a copper bromide laser. Comparison in divergences was made for a filtering resonator and an unstable confocal resonator. The effect of hydrogen on laser performance of a CVL was investigated. A low power MOPA CuBr laser system has been brought into operation.
Copper bromide laser system
The work on the development and making of a unique new copper bromide laser system, consisting of generator and amplifier stages, has been completed. The MOPA copper bromide laser system is applicable to industry for precision processing of different types of hard materials such as metals, ceramics and plastics; drilling microholes, and as well for marking and cutting. The maximum output power of the laser system is 100 W. The laser beam quality is near the diffraction limit. That permits high precision micro-processing of materials. The end-user of this scientific product is the Bulgarian enterprise Pulslight Co.

1. Nikola V.Sabotinov, Recent progress in copper vapor lasers, invited paper, Proceedings of SPIE Vol.5120 XIV International Symposium on Gas Flow, Chemical Lasers, and High-Power Lasers, edited by Krysztof M.Abramski, Edward F.Plinski, Wieslaw Wolinski, (SPIE, Bellingham, WA, 2003), 30-37, (2003)
2. M. Grozeva, A. Bogaerts, R. Gijbels and N. Sabotinov, Investigation of laser output power saturation in the He-Cu+ IR hollow cathode discharge laser by experiments and numerical modeling, Physica .Scripta T105, 90-97, (2003)
3. N. K. Vuchkov, K. A. Temelkov, P. V. Zahariev, N. V. Sabotinov, "Spectral and spatial characteristics of UV Cu+ laser excited in a nanosecond pulsed longitudinal Ne-CuBr d ischarge", Proceed. SPIE, vol. 5226, pp. 44-48, (2003)
4. Diana B. Mihailova, Margarita G. Grozeva, Annemie Bogaerts, R. H. Gijbels, Nikola V. Sabotinov, Longitudinal hollow cathode copper ion laser: optimization of excitation and geometry, Proceed. SPIE, vol. 5226, pp. 49-53, (2003)
5. Georgy T. Todorov, Nikola V. Sabotinov, P. Telbizov, Lyubomir P. Petrov, Dimitar G. Slavov, V. Arsov, Zdravka S. Yordanova, Laser-induced galvanic signals from Se, Ar, and Ne ion transitions in a hollow cathode discharge, Proceed. SPIE, vol. 5226, pp. 159-163, (2003)
6. Ivailo I. Balchev, Nikolai I. Minkovski, Nikola V. Sabotinov, Ivan K. Kostadinov, Micromachining with copper bromide laser, Proceed. SPIE, vol. 5226, pp. 372-376, (2003)
7. Shirakawa, K. Takaichi, H. Yagi, J. -F. Bisson, J. Lu, M. Musha, K. Ueda, T. Yanagitani, T. S. Petrov, A. A. Kaminskii,"Diode-pumped mode-locked Yb3+:Y2O3 ceramic laser", Optics Express, 11 (No. 22) , pp. 2911 - 2916, (2003)
8. L. Pramatarova, E. Pecheva, D. Nesheva, Z. Levi, Z. Aneva, R. Pramatarova, U. Bismayer, and T. Petrov, "Study of modified solid surfaces by nanostructured CdSe in SiO_x thin films",PHYSICA STATUS SOLIDI(C), 0003(No. 1) , (2003)
9. T. Halfmann, T. Rickes, N. V. Vitanov and K. Bergmann, Lineshapes in coherent two-photon excitation, Opt. Commun. 220, 353-359 (2003)
10. S. Marienfeld, Y. Pashayan, N. V. Vitanov, B. W. Shore, H. Hotop, and K. Bergmann, Influence of laser bandwidth and transit time on the excitation probability of a rovibrational two-level system, J. Chem. Phys. 119, 5069-5077 (2003)
11. N. V. Vitanov, L. P. Yatsenko, and K. Bergmann, Population transfer by amplitude-modulated pulse, Phys. Rev. A 68, 043401 (2003)
12. L. P. Yatsenko, B. W. Shore, N. V. Vitanov, and K. Bergmann, Retroreflection-induced bichromatic adiabatic passage, Phys. Rev. A 68, 043405 (2003)
13. F. Vewinger, M. Heinz, R. Garcia Fernandez, N. V. Vitanov,and K. Bergmann, Creation and measurement of coherent superposition of quantum states, Phys. Rev. Lett. 91, 213001 (2003)
14. N. V. Vitanov, Z. Kis, and B. W. Shore, Coherent excitation of a degenerate two-level system by an elliptically polarized laser pulse, Phys. Rev. A 68, 063414 (2003)
15. R. Djulgerova, B.Panchev, V.Mihailov, V.Gencheva, J.Flaga. Concentration profiles of ion exchanged optical waveguides in glass: analysed in hollow cathode plasma. Surface and Coating Technology 166, 201-205 (2003).

1. N. K. Vuchkov, P. V. Zahariev, K. A. Temelkov, N. V. Sabotinov, Output parameters and a spectral study of UV Cu+ Ne-CuBr laser, Optics and Laser Tech., vol.36, pp.19-25, (2004)
2. N. K. Vuchkov, K. A. Temelkov, P. V. Zahariev, N. V. Sabotinov, A new laser tube construction for the UV Cu+ laser, Proceed. of SPIE
3. Ivailo I. Balchev, Nikolai I. Minkovski, Krassimir D. Dimitrov and Nikola V.Sabotinov, High-Precision Machining with Copper Bromide Laser, Proc. of SPIE
4. Nikola V.Sabotinov, Development of new high power copper bromide lasers, Proc. of SPIE
5. Nikola V.Sabotinov, Development of deep ultraviolet metal vapor lasers, Proc. of SPIE
6. M. Grozeva, D. Mihailova, N. Sabotinov, A. Bogaerts, and R. Gijbels, Effect of cathode length on the excitation efficiency of a sputtering hollow cathode copper ion laser, Proc. of SPIE
7. N. V. Vitanov and B. Girard, Adiabatic excitation of rotational ladder by chirped laser pulses, Phys. Rev. A

1. M. Grozeva, D. Mihailova, A. Bogaerts, R. Gijbels, and N. Sabotinov, M.Godefroid, P.Quinet, Spectroscopic studies of a sputtering copper ion laser excited in a longitudinal hollow cathode discharge, EGAS-35, Brussels, Belgium, July (2003), eds. H.-P.Garnir, Europhysics Conf. Abstracts v.27B, p.229 (P2:56), (2003)

PhD students: 1
Graduate (Diploma theses) students: 2

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