Amplifying optical scheme in high-power continuous-wave industrial CO2 lasers

Wavefront aberrations and Gaussian beam profile distortions have been experimentally studied in the amplifier using carbon-dioxide:N2:He mixture as the active medium, with transverse flowing and about 5 kW power. As a pumping generator a laser with single-mode stable resonator and beam power close to 1 kW was used. The obtained experimental data were correlated with the estimated values of beam power and wavefront distortions caused by thermal deformations of reflection mirrors and optical nonuniformities in active medium. It has been shown that the amplifying scheme enables us to improve the beam quality with retention of industrial carbon-dioxide-laser high power, provided there exists the agreement between the amplified beam and amplifier parameters.