Lasers have been developed that are not much larger than a common flashlight. Various materials have been used as the active media in lasers. This first ruby laser produced intense pulses of red light. In some lasers, a gas or liquid is used as the emitting medium. In one kind of gas laser the inverted population is achieved through collisional pumping, the gas molecules gaining energy from collisions with other molecules or with electrons released through current discharge.
Some gas lasers make use of molecular dissociation to create the inverted population.
Listing from Electric Library , a pay service. Copyright 2001 Infonautics Corporation . All rights reserved. Hauspie Speech Products N.V. All rights reserved.