We obtain the output of a 284 ps pulse duration without tail modulation based on stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) pulse compression pumped by an 8 ns-pulse-duration, 1064 nm-wavelength Q-switched Nd:YAG laser. To suppress the tail modulation in SBS pulse compression, proper attenuators, which can control the pump energy within a rational range, are added in a generator-amplifier setup. The experimental result shows that the effective energy conversion efficiency triples when the pump energy reaches 700 mJ to 51%, compared with the conventional generator-amplifier setup.

A 100-J-level Nd:glass laser system in nanosecond-scale pulse width has been constructed to perform as a standard source of high-fluence-laser science experiments. The laser system, operating with typical pulse durations of 3–5 ns and beam diameter 60 mm, employs a sequence of successive rod amplifiers to achieve 100-J-level energy at 1053 nm at 3 ns. The frequency conversion can provide energy of 50-J level at 351 nm. In addition to the high stability of the energy output, the most valuable of the laser system is the high spatiotemporal beam quality of the output, which contains the uniform square pulse waveform, the uniform flat-top spatial fluence distribution and the uniform flat-top wavefront.

The characteristics of stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS) in perfluorinated amine media and the experimental structure used in hundreds of picoseconds pulse compression at 532 nm are demonstrated. A two-stage SBS pulse compression structure is adopted for this work. The compact double-cell SBS compression structure and the scattering media FC-70 are chosen to compress the incident light from 9.5 to about 1 ns in the first stage. Then, the light is used as the pumping source for the second pulse compression. In the second stage, using a single-cell SBS structure in a pulse compression system, perfluorinated amine media with different phonon lifetimes, such as FC-3283, FC-40, FC-43, and FC-70, are chosen to run the comparative experimental study. The narrowest compressed pulse times obtained are 294, 274, 277, and 194 ps; they respectively correspond to the above listed media. The average width of the compressed pulse width is 320 ps for FC-3283, with a fluctuation range of 87 ps. For FC-40, the average pulse width is 320 ps, with a fluctuation range of 72 ps. And for FC-43, the average pulse width is 335 ps, with a fluctuation range of 88 ps. However, the average pulse width is only 280 ps for FC-70, with a fluctuation range of 57 ps. The highest energy reflectivity is more than 80% for all of the media. The experimental results show that a two-stage SBS pulse compression system has lower pump energy requirements, thus making it easier to achieve a compressed pulse waveform. The results also show that the shorter the phonon lifetime of the medium, the narrower the obtained compressed pulse width.