Organic lasers are broadly tunable coherent sources, potentially compact, convenient and manufactured at low-costs. Appeared in the mid 60’s as solid-state alternatives for liquid dye lasers, they recently gained a new dimension after the demonstration of organic semiconductor lasers in the 90's. More recently, new perspectives appeared at the nanoscale, with organic polariton and surface plasmon lasers. After a brief reminder to laser physics, a first chapter exposes what makes organic solid-state organic lasers specific. The laser architectures used in organic lasers are then reviewed, with a state-of-the-art review of the performances of devices with regard to output power, threshold, lifetime, beam quality etc. A survey of the recent trends in the field is given, highlighting the latest developments with a special focus on the challenges remaining for achieving direct electrical pumping of organic semiconductor lasers. A last chapter covers the applications of organic solid-state lasers.

One of the biggest challenges of organic optoelectronics is the realization of the first organic laser diode (electrically pumped) which has a very strong potential for many applications. Similar to what happened in the field of inorganic optoelectronics when transforming LEDs into LDs, the race is on to transform an OLED into an OLD. This involves the development of innovative solutions to overcome the difficulties inherent in organic materials and the electric pump. This book presents the elements of physics, materials and technologies that allow us to understand the basics of organic lasers and to capture the progress made. It also provides guidance for future developments towards the organic laser diode. Describes the latest advancements in the development of organic lasers, one of the most challenging issues of the early part of this century Provides a detailed description of material features Features the state-of-the-art of organic sources and their potential applications Contains several topics currently under development

In the past 30 years, organic conjugated molecules have received a lot of attention in research because of their unique combination of active properties typical of semiconductors and the technological appeal typical of plastic materials. Among the different applications proposed for organic materials, organic lasers are quickly approaching the performance required in real devices, while research on novel active materials is still ongoing. The book covers the basic aspects of the measurement techniques of optical gain and amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) in organic films as well as the photophysics of organic materials that can be understood using ASE measurements. It reviews the recent advances in the development of new active materials for organic lasers as well as the actual state of the art of scattering-assisted random lasers and of strongly coupled organic microcavities, both promising interesting developments in the near future. Finally, it gives a detailed review of the state of the art of the organic lasers actually closest to real applications, namely external cavity lasers and distributed feedback lasers. The book is unique that it covers basic aspects, technological aspects, and systems, which are still a subject of basic science research.

A solid-state laser use and gain medium that is a solid, rather than a liquid such as dye lasers or a gas such as gas lasers. Semiconductor-based lasers are also in the solid state, but are generally considered separately from solid-state lasers. Generally, the active medium of a solid-state laser consists of a glass or crystalline host material to which is added a dopant such as neodymium, chromium, erbium, or other ions. Many of the common dopants are rare earth elements, because the excited states of such ions are not strongly coupled with thermal vibrations of the crystalline lattice (phonons), and the lasing threshold can be reached at relatively low brightness of pump. There are many hundreds of solid-state media in which laser action has been achieved, but relatively few types are in widespread use. Of these, probably the most common type is neodymium doped YAG. Neodymium-doped glass (Nd:glass) and Ytterbium-doped glasses and ceramics are used in solid-state lasers at extremely high power (terawatt scale), high energy (megajoules) multiple beam systems for inertial confinement fusion. Titanium doped sapphire is also widely used for its broad tunability. This book gathers new research in the field.