Abstract

Potassium niobate has been shown to be an efficient material for upconversion of near IR radiation into the visible due to its large nonlinear optical coefficients and the possibility for noncritical phase matching by temperature tuning. Efficient second harmonic generation (SHG) has been demonstrated for fundamental radiation of Nd:YAG lasers (1064 and 946 nm), LiNbO₃ optical parametric oscillators, Styril-9 dye lasers, and AlGaAs laser diodes.^1-6 KNbO₃, due to its SHG phase matching range of 840-950 nm using the nonlinear coefficient d₃₂ (= 21 pm/V),¹ is ideally suited to upconvert the radiation of a Ti:sapphire laser and obtain an all solid state tunable blue laser.

© 1990 Optical Society of America