Laser beam combining in potassium vapor

Energy transfer between two laser beams of comparable intensity due to their nonlinear interactions in an atomic vapor was investigated. Strong coupling occurs due to stimulated Rayleigh scattering when the frequencies of the two waves differ by the inverse of the excited-state lifetime. The energy transfer between two nearly equal energy pulses from an alexandrite laser tuned near the 4/sup 2/S/sub 1/2/ to 4/sup 2/P/sub 3/2/ transition of potassium vapor was measured. It was found that as much as 85% of the total incident energy was contained in one of the output beams.>