Narrow gap slab discharges for fast axial flow lasers

In recent years, narrow electrode gap, area scalable discharges produced by transverse RF excitation have given major increases in power density for diffusion cooled CO₂, CO and Xe lasers, with hybrid resonators, such as the stable/waveguide-unstable configuration giving high beam quality. Fast flow gas lasers produce higher total power, but operate at lower power density, limited by gas flow and discharge stability effects. This paper investigates the narrow gap, slab RF discharge with fast axial gas flow as a route to high pressure, high power density, continuously operating gas lasers.