The spectral linewidth of a transversely excited pulsed CO2 laser is broadened at high working pressures. This phenomenon causes a decrease in the upper-level lifetime such that the pulse width is significantly compressed. Although the tail part of CO2 laser pulses owns a non-negligible proportion of total energy, it has minor effects during the interaction process between photons and materials due to its low amplitude. Thus, it is of great significance to yield the tail part and generate a narrow pulse in most applications. In this study, a continuously tunable pulsed CO2 laser with a low nitrogen proportion in the mixture is developed to generate tail-free short pulses; a minimum pulse width of 30.60 ns with a maximum pulse energy of 481 mJ is synchronously achieved at a pressure of 7 atm, and the estimated peak power is above 15 MW. A numerical simulation is also conducted for comparison with the experimental results. The contribution of the spectral gain toward the compression of the pulse width is discussed in the last section of this paper.

射频电源是RF-CO₂激光器中的一个重要部件。在开发一个新的RF-CO₂激光器时，由于激光器负载和射频电源匹配失调，在调试过程中容易造成射频功放功率管击穿、烧损。为解决这一问题，设计了一套集数据采集、自动保护控制和可视化技术为一体的RF-CO₂激光器射频电源监控平台。平台采用软件和硬件相结合的方式，在射频电源中嵌入控制模块，搭建数据采集系统和自动保护系统，并结合电路设计软件平台完成对射频电源的数据信息采集和保护控制。经过实验测试，平台可以有效避免射频电源功率管的损坏，实现射频电源的自动保护，并完成射频电源系统的数据采集和远程保护控制，缩短了RF-CO₂激光器的调试周期，提高了整机的开发效率。