Investigation of the steady-state stimulated thermal scattering in absorbing media

Abstract: In this paper we study the effects of the laser pulse width and of the thermalization time on the gain and conversion efficiency of stimulated thermal scattering and on the critical absorption coefficient in absorbing media. During the parametric processes of various stimulated scattering events, only a resonantly enhanced scattering can dominate in the medium. Our results show that longer pulses and longer thermalization times yield higher gain in the stimulated thermal scattering and lower critical absorption coefficient. Thus, the conversion efficiency of stimulated thermal scattering is strong enough to suppress the appearance of stimulated Brillouin scattering with the same pump intensity, which may provide some theoretical references for application of stimulated thermal scattering in various compensating phase aberration systems with high-power long pulse laser. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]