Patent ID: 7535947

Claim:
A method for creating a layer of inactive laser species in the near surface region of a laser rod using dopant ions, the laser rod having longitudinal axis and a radial periphery about the longitudinal axis, the method comprising: providing an as-grown laser rod having active laser dopant ions of a first valence therein; placing pre-selected chemical constituents into intimate contact with the surface of the laser rod; and diffusing the chemical constituents into the laser rod as interstitial ions that reduce the valence state of the active laser dopant ions to a second valence, thereby decreasing the concentration of the active laser dopant ions of a first valence at the near-surface periphery region and thereby forming a radial-dependent concentration profile of the first valence state dopant ions that is lower at the radial periphery as compared to the concentration of the first valence state dopant ions along the longitudinal axis; wherein the laser rod is yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG); wherein the dopant species having the first valence state is Yb3+; wherein the reducing interstitial ions are Li+.