Influence of remanent electron density on the performance of copper HyBrID lasers

Abstract Evidence is presented for the strong removal of free electrons in the interpulse period of copper HyBrID lasers when HBr is added. Electron attachment and accelerated recombination processes lead to a relatively low free electron density at the end of each interpulse period. The influence of the low number of remanent electrons on various discharge characteristics is held to be ultimately responsible for the higher efficiencies, larger specific average output powers and superior beam characteristics of that type of laser compared with conventional copper lasers.