SBS Mirrors for High Power Lasers

Abstract

This paper is an overview of results obtained in investigations of SBS-based phase-conjugated devises: new possibilities and results achieved at the Institute of Experimental Physics of the Russian Federal Nuclear Center on development of SBS mirrors for a wide range of lasers (gas and solid-state). Special attention has been paid to questions of preparation and inlet of the SBS-mirror gas media. We give the SBS cell parameters and characteristics of various gas mixtures in a wide range of pressures and densities also including characteristics near the critical point and of liquefied gases as well. We give experimental results from investigations of processes competing with SBS at pulse lengths from 2ns to tens of microseconds when irradiated by single pulse or repetitively pulsed radiation with the pulse rate up to hundreds of kHz. The possibility of self-compensation of thermal and striction distortions in the SBS medium has been demonstrated experimentally. We have formulated criteria for selection of mixtures for SBS mirror operation under various conditions taking into account radiation self-action.