Novel 1066nm Nd:GdYTaO4 laser under indirect and direct pumping

CW and acousto-optically Q-switched operations with a novel Nd:Gd0.69Y0.3TaO4 mixed crystal were demonstrated for the first time under indirect and direct pumping. The highest slope efficiency of 48.3% was obtained with an output power of 5.6 W under 879 nm pumping. The pulsed laser performances were obviously improved by 879nm pumping instead of 808nm pumping, the maximum average output power was increased from 0.76 W to 1.33 W, the pulse width was reduced from 24 ns to 18.5 ns at the repetition rate of 10kHz.