Laser Physics, 5 cr

Tampere University

Teaching periods

Course code

FYS.501

Language of instruction

English

Academic years

2021–2022, 2022–2023, 2023–2024

Level of study

Advanced studies

Grading scale

General scale, 0-5

Persons responsible

Responsible teacher:

Marco Ornigotti

Responsible teacher:

Goery Genty

Responsible organisation

Faculty of Engineering and Natural Sciences 100 %

Core content

Basic structure of a laser
Properties of a laser beam:
- Coherence
- Directionality
- Monochromaticity
- Brightness
Fundamental interactions between light and matter
- Fundamental processes
- 2-, 3-, and 4-level systems
- Population inversion
- Semiclassical theory of light-matter interaction
- Broadening mechanisms
- Saturation of absorption and gain
Optical resonators properties
- Ray optics approach to optical resonators
- Fabry-Perot interferometer
- ABCD matrices
- Stability of an optical resonator
- Quality factor and cavity lifetime
Paraxial Optics and Gaussian beams
- Paraxial approximation
- Fundamental Gaussian beam
- Higher-order modes and cavity symmetry
Continuous wave laser operation
- Rate equations
- Conversion efficiency
- Optimisation of output power