Pulse shaping of transversely excited atmospheric CO2 laser using a simple plasma shutter

The pulse from a transversely excited atmospheric CO2 laser consists of a sharp spike followed by a long, drawn out tail region spanning about 2-5 mu s caused by the nitrogen gas in the laser cavity. The nitrogen tail is undesirable in many applications because it decreases the average power of the laser pulse. We employ a pinhole plasma shutter for eliminating the nitrogen tail and shortening the pulse width. The pinhole shutter optically triggers plasma at a certain point in time with respect to the temporal profile of the laser pulse. This way, a good portion of the sharp spike is transmitted, while the energy stored in the nitrogen tail is consumed in heating the plasma. This simplistic plasma shutter is easy to build and inexpensive compared to other existing plasma shutter designs.