High Efficiency, Scalable, 130 nm Coherent Source by Four-Wave Mixing in Hg Vapor

Abstract

Coherent vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) pulses with energy 1.1 mJ, 3 ns pulse length (1.3 MW cm-2 unfocused), and measured bandwidth <0.1 cm-1 have been achieved using four-wave sum-frequency mixing in mercury vapor. High energy conversion efficiencies of 5 percent have been demonstrated in a collimated beam geometry over 1 meter interaction lengths. The 130 nm radiation is tunable over 2.5 cm-1. The experimental facility assembled to produce this efficient VUV laser source will be described, and comparison between experimental measurements and theory are provided.