Lasers

Kirit Makwana
Department of Physics, IIT Hyderabad
EP1108-Modern Physics

Kirit MakwanaDepartment of Physics, IIT HyderabadEP1108-Modern

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 Introduction

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 Study resources

“Optics” by Ajoy Ghatak, ISBN-10 : 9390113598 - Chapter 26

https://spie.org/Documents/Courses/OP-TEC/Course_1_
Fundamentals_of_Light_and_Lasers_3rd_Edition_2018.pdf -
Module 6 contains material on lasers
https://ocw.mit.edu/resources/
res-6-005-understanding-lasers-and-fiberoptics-spring-200
laser-fundamentals-i/

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 What is a laser?

LASER is an acronym for “Light Amplification by Stimulated

Emission of Radiation”
Laser is a special form of light
Classically, light is an electromagnetic wave
It is made out of electric and magnetic fields that obey the Maxwell
equations
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nt-A1Cr6Aao - Nice
animation of how electric and magnetic fields look like in a light wave

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 Properties of Ordinary light
Sunlight consists of well-known seven colors - its a blackbody
spectrum

Its a broadband-spectrum, spread out over a decade of wavelengths

Similar is the light from torches, light-bulbs, lamps, neon lights, etc.

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 Narrow spectrum of a laser

A laser light consists of light waves of a very specific wavelength, i.e.,

their spectrum is extremely narrow

This is also called as monochromatic (single color)

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 Coherence
Coherence refers to continuity of the waveform - both in time and
space

Figure: credit: www.telescope-optics.net

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 Coherence and beaming
Lasers have a much higher spatial and temporal coherence compared
to other light sources
Laser have high directionality and very little divergence. A beam of
laser will spread less than 10−5 radians

Figure: credit: GSFC NASA

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 Applications of lasers
Tumour and kidney stone Precision drilling
removal Heat treatment in auto industry
Eye surgery Spectroscopy, microscopy
Laser endoscopy CD, DVD, Blu-ray
Dental surgery Laser printers
Cosmetic surgery Detecting earthquakes and
Fiber-optic communication underwater blasts
Space and satellite Range finders
communication Radar
Cutting glass and quartz Guidance systems
Photolithography to Laser welding
manufacture microprocessors Precision metrology for railways,
Production of industrial plasmas airways
Barcode scanner ...and many more...
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 Stimulated emission

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 Quantum nature of light
Classically light is an electromagnetic wave
When light is analyzed closely, it is found to consist of particles -
called photons

▶ This is demonstrated by the

photoelectric effect - light shines on
metals and excites electrons
▶ The electrons are not emitted if the
frequency of light is below a certain
threshold, no matter how intense
the light is
▶ This implies that light is made up
of small packets (photons) which
can be absorbed wholly, not
partially

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 Energy levels
The electrons in an atom can occupy only discrete energy levels, i.e.,
the energy levels are “quantized”, as suggested by the Bohr model

An electron can be excited by absorbing a photon, or it can de-excite

be emitting a photon
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 Photon absorption and emission

Consider a bunch of atoms interacting with a bath of photons

Lets say the atoms have two energy levels E1 and E2 . An electron in
the lower level E1 can be excited to the level E2 if it absorbs a photon
of light with frequency ν = ∆E /h
Conversely, if the electron de-excites from E2 to E1 then it emits a
photon of the same frequency
h = 6.63 × 10−34 Js is the Planck’s constant

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 Rate of stimulated absorption
The process of excitation is called stimulated absorption, because it is
stimulated by the absorption of a photon
The rate of stimulated absorption is the number of photons absorbed
per unit time per unit volume. It will be proportional to the number
of atoms (per unit volume) N1 in energy level E1 and the number of
photons present per unit volume.
The number of photons present is proportional to the energy density
of the light, which is u(ν). This represents the radiation energy per
unit volume at frequency ν.
Thus we can write the rate of change of atoms from state N1 to N2
due to stimulated absorption is

dN2 
= B12 N1 u(ν) (1)
dt absorption

B12 is the proportionality constant.

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 Spontaneous emission

If an atom is in excited state E2 then it will spontaneously emit a

photon and relax to state E1 . This is a random process and occurs
spontaneously.
The rate of this emission will depend only on how many atoms are
there in state N2 , like the law of radioactive decay (as there is a fixed
probability of decay of an excited state in a certain time, independent
of other factors). So this rate can be written as

dN2 
= −A21 N2 (2)
dt spontaneous emission

A21 is the proportionality constant. The negative sign indicates that

N2 will reduce due to emission of photons.

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 Stimulated emission
In 1917, Albert Einstein proposed that there should be third process
called “stimulated emission” (we will soon see why this process has to
exist)
In this process, an incident photon of appropriate frequency triggers
an atom in the excited state to emit radiation
Based on principles of time-reversal symmetry and also conservation
of momentum it is predicted that the emitted photon will have the
same direction and energy as the incident photon

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 Rate of stimulated emission
The rate of stimulated emission will also be proportional to the
number of atoms present in excited state N2 and the number of
incident photons. This is given by

dN2 
= −B21 N2 u(ν) (3)
dt stimulated emission

B21 is the proportionality constant. The negative sign again indicates

that N2 will reduce due to emission.
Now if the gas of atoms and this bath of photons is in thermal
equilibrium, then the number of atoms N2 should not change, i.e.,
 
dN2  dN2 
+ + (4)
dt absorption dt spontaneous emission

dN2 
=0 (5)
dt  stimulated emission

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 Einstein coefficients

This implies

B12 N1 u(ν)−A21 N2 − B21 N2 u(ν) = 0 (6)

A21
=⇒ u(ν) = N1
(7)
B12 N2 − B21

Now, according to the Maxwell-Boltzmann statistics of

thermodynamics, the number of atoms in thermal equilibrium is
proportional to N ∝ e −E /(kB T ) , where kB is the Boltzmann constant
This gives N1 /N2 = e (E2 −E1 )/(kB T ) = e hν/(kB T ) . Plugging this back
gives
A21
u(ν) = hν/(k
(8)
B12 e BT) − B
21

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 Einstein coefficients
Now we also know the Planck’s law of energy distribution of photons
in a black-body radiation is

2hν 3 n03 1
u(ν) = 3 hν/(k
(9)
c e BT) − 1

where n0 is the refractive index of the medium

Comparing the 2 expressions of the photon energy density u(ν), we
can conclude that
B12 = B21 ≡ B (10)
A21 A 2hν 3 n03
≡ = (11)
B B c3
A and B are called Einstein coefficients
We see that if we had not taken the process of stimulated emission,
i.e., B21=0 , then we will not get Planck’s law. Thus stimulated
emission was postulated by Einstein.
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 Population Inversion

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 Ratio of spontaneous to stimulated emission

The ratio of spontaneous to stimulated emission is



dN2 /dt 
A
spontaneous emission = = e hν/(kB T ) − 1 (12)
 Bu(ν)
dN2 /dt 
stimulated emission

Consider a normal light source which has temperature T = 1000K

and a wavelength of 6000Å. This gives ν = c/λ = 5 × 1014 Hz. So
A/(Bu(ν)) = 3 × 1010
This in normal circumstances, the spontaneous emission will be much,
much stronger than the stimulated emission.
The spontaneous emission is random and so ordinary light is
incoherent.

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 A coefficient
The decay rate of state N2 under spontaneous emission is

dN2 
= −AN2 =⇒ N2 = e −At (13)
dt spontaneous emission

Lets call A ≡ 1/tsp , then the decay due to spontaneous emission

becomes N2 = exp(−t/tsp )
So A is the inverse lifetime of the upper level under spontaneous
emission
To get laser light we want more stimulated emission than
spontaneous emission
It was realized that in order to get more stimulated emissions rather
than spontaneous emissions, we need N2 > N1 - because then an
incident photon has more probability to stimulate rather than absorb
But it was clear that in thermodynamic equilibrium this is not possible

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 Maser-Laser invention

“...Although I had considered

molecules before, I had
dismissed them because of
certain laws of thermodynamics.
But suddenly I recognized,
”Hey, molecules don’t have to
obey such a law if they are not
in equilibrium.” ..... Wow! It
looked possible.” - Charles H.
Townes

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 Metastable states

The population inversion is done by means of a metastable state -

this is an excited state which has a long lifetime to decay via
spontaneous emission

The first laser created by Theodore Maiman was a Ruby laser with
the above energy levels

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 Metastable states

Ruby crystal is Al2 O3 with some Aluminum atoms replaced with

Chromium
The E1 and E2 energy levels have a lifetime of 10−8 s, whereas the
state M has a lifetime of 3 × 10−3 s
The atoms are quickly excited to state E1 and E2 by optical pump
They quickly decay to state M, but then they stay there for a long
time. Since the Chromium atoms are isolated, this helps in keeping
them excited for a longer time
This creates population inversion and creates a gain medium where
light is then amplified

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 Optical Resonators

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 Ruby Laser
Construction of ruby laser - The flash light optically pumps and
excites the Chromium atoms to excited states

Figure: Prof. Amit Mourya

The Ruby crystal is a cylinder with one end totally reflecting and
another end partially reflecting - this is called a resonator so that light
rays stay inside and get amplified
Laser light leaks from one end of the partially reflecting mirror
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 Resonator

The 3 components of a laser - the active medium (or gain medium),

an optical resonator, & a pump to create population inversion

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 Resonant modes
Consider a light beam that is reflected in a resonator. The condition
for constructive interference is
2d
= m; m = 1, 2, 3, ... (14)
λ
Here d is the length of the cavity, so the light travels distance 2d to
return to the same spot, which should be an integral multiple of the
wavelength to interfere constructively
The wavelength in the active medium would be λ = λ0 /n0 , where λ0
is the wavelength in vacuum and n0 is the refractive index of the
active medium
The resonant frequencies are
c cm
ν= = (15)
λ0 n0 2d

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 Spectral width and resonant modes
The frequency difference between the resonant modes is
c
δν = (16)
n0 2d

We earlier saw that the energy of the excited state will have some
spread due to the uncertainty principle - this will cause a range of
frequencies in the laser light
Other factors will also broaden the frequency range - like Doppler
broadening
Due to the optical resonator, we will find only the resonant modes
which lie within this frequency range in the laser light
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 Further courses

EP3220 - Modern Optics

EP3338 - Laser and Photonics
EP4118 - Laser Spectroscopy

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