We developed a systematic experimental method to demonstrate that damage threshold fluence (DTF) for fused silica changes with the number of femtosecond laser (800 nm, $65\pm 5~\text{fs}$, 10 Hz and 600 Hz) pulses. Based on the experimental data, we were able to develop a model which indicates that the change in DTF varies with the number of shots logarithmically up to a critical value. Above this value, DTF approaches an asymptotic value. Both DTF for a single shot and the asymptotic value as well as the critical value where this happens, are extrinsic parameters dependent on the configuration (repetition rate, pressure and geometry near or at the surface). These measurements indicate that the power of this dependence is an intrinsic parameter independent of the configuration.

We evaluate the effects of the holes geometry drilled by a femtosecond laser on a stainless alloy with various defocused irradiation time, which ranges from 0 min to 1 h. The laser ablation efficiency is increased by a factor of 3 when the irradiation time is elevated from 0 to 30 min. Also, the morphology of the hole is observed by a scanning electron microscope, where the result indicates that the defocused irradiation time has a significant influence on the morphology changes. The reason for such changes is discussed based on the pretreatment effect and the confined plasma plume. As an application example, the microchannel is fabricated by a femtosecond laser combined with the defocused irradiation to demonstrate the advantage of the proposed method in fabricating functional structures.

Using a novel silver nanorods absorber with a localized surface plasmon resonance absorption peak at 1.06 μm, we obtain a diode-pumped passively Q-switched (PQS) Nd,Gd:CaF2 disordered crystal laser output. Its PQS pulse laser performances are studied comprehensively and systematically in this Letter. The single pulse energy and peak power can be attained to 2.15 μJ and 2.06 W, respectively.

We demonstrate the electrical beat note analysis and radio frequency (RF) injection locking of a continuous wave (cw) terahertz quantum cascade laser (QCL) emitting around 3 THz (～100 μm). In free running the beat note frequency of the QCL shows a shift of ～180 MHz with increasing drive current. The beat note, modulation response, injection pulling, and terahertz emission spectral characteristics in the different current regimes I, II, and III are investigated. The results show that in the current regime I close to the laser threshold we obtain a narrower beat note and flat response to the RF modulation at the cavity round trip frequency. The pulling effect and spectral modulation measurements verify that in the current regime I the RF injection locking is more efficient and a robust tool to modulate the mode number and mode frequency of terahertz QCLs.

A dual-wavelength fiber laser operating at the 1550 nm region using a side-polished arc-shaped fiber with deposited ZnO nanoparticles is proposed and demonstrated. The arc-polished fiber is fabricated by using a simple but novel approach in which a silicon carbide paper polishes one side of a conventional single-mode fiber. An arc-polished fiber with a length of 2.25 mm and an insertion loss of 0.95 dB is obtained and deposited with ZnO nanoparticles by the drop-cast method. A stable dual-wavelength output is obtained at 1562.5 and 1563.4 nm at peak powers of 9.3 and 10.1 dBm, respectively, as well as a signal-to-noise ratio of 28.4 dB and a channel spacing of 0.9 nm. Both lasing wavelengths also have narrow linewidths of between 0.045 and 0.049 nm and show little to no wavelength or power fluctuations over continued testing.