Fluctuation of number of photons in a multimode laser

Wallace Arden Smith

A. V. Kozlovskiĭ

Theoretical and experimental results of investigations into the quantum noise of multimode laser radiation are considered. The feasibility of generating light with a photon-number-squeezed (sub-Poissonian) photon distribution by a multimode laser with a homogeneously broadened line is analyzed. The conditions of noisy and noiseless (regular) pumping are considered. Photon-number fluctuations of the net laser radiation summed over all generated modes are calculated in the approximation of equidistant equal modes, as are photon-number fluctuations in an individual mode inside and outside the resonator. Output-radiation noise spectra and photon-number fluctuations are calculated for solid-state (neodymium glass, Nd:YAG) and semiconductor lasers. Theoretical results are compared with a number of experimental data obtained for semiconductor lasers in recent years.

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T. U. Arslanbekov, N. B. Belone, Anatoly Viktorovich Masalov +2 more

Vladimir R. Mironenko, Vladimir I. Yudson

It is shown theoretically that the relative fluctuations in the numbers of photons in individual modes of a multimode standing-wave laser with a homogeneously broadened gain profile is extremely sensitive to the degree of filling of the resonator with the active medium. If this medium fills the whole resonator, the spatial effects result in strong suppression of fluctuations in the individual modes. In the opposite case of a thin medium the statistical properties of a multimode standing-wave laser are close to those of a traveling-wave laser. The conclusions reached are used in an analysis of the quantitative discrepancy between the results of published experimental studies of the statistics of multimode lasing.

Valery M. Baev, Gerhard Gaida, H. Schröder +1 more