XeF laser pumped by high-power sliding discharges

We have developed a high-power XeF laser photolytically pumped by two surface discharges. The discharges slide along 760-mm-long by 12-mm-wide ferrite rods. They were energized by a single 6 μF capacitor at 50 kV in a fast discharge circuit. Each emitted up to 38 kW nm−1 cm−2 at 140 nm in 3-μs-long pulses. This powerful radiation source was used to photolyze mixtures of 450 Torr argon, 50 Torr nitrogen, and up to 12 Torr XeF2 in an active volume of about 1 ℓ. We extracted a maximum specific laser output energy density of 8 J/ℓ at 351 nm from the B–X transition of XeF.