Materials for high-average power solid-state lasers

High-average power solid-state lasers use Nd or Yb lasants doped into a variety of host materials. Desirable properties for such materials include favorable spectroscopy, thermomechanical and thermo-optical parameters, and availability of the host material in large size and good quality. A laser designer often faces difficult choices because no combination of dopant and host materials incorporates all of the most desirable properties. This work presents a comparative study of gain media for diode-pumped, high-average power solid-state disk lasers. Relative performance of Nd and Yb doped into several host media is evaluated under several pump conditions.