High-repetition-rate pulsed CO2 laser

A theoretical analysis is presented of the effect of weak shock waves arising during fast energy input into a pulsed flow-through CO2 laser on the pulse repetition frequency, with consideration of the effect of the accumulation of energy dissipated by waves propagating up the flow. It is shown that, in the one-dimensional approximation, the effect of shock waves (even with energy accumulation) can be neglected. In experiments on a CO2 laser with a pulse repetition frequency up to 100 Hz, a mean power of 800 W was attained.