Waves and rays in plano-concave laser cavities: II. A semiclassical approach

A. Pascal (1) , S. Bittner (2) , B. Dietz , A. Trabattoni (1) , C. Ulysse (3) , Marco Romanelli (4) , Marc Brunel (4) , J. Zyss (1) , M. Lebental (1)

1 LPQM - Laboratoire de Photonique Quantique et Moléculaire
2 Department of Applied Physics, Yale University
3 C2N - Centre de Nanosciences et de Nanotechnologies [Orsay]
4 IPR - Institut de Physique de Rennes

This second paper on the Fabry-Perot cavity presents a semi-classical approach, which means that we consider the transition from wave optics to geometrical optics. The basic concepts are the periodic orbits and their stability. For the plano-concave Fabry-Perot cavity in the paraxial approximation, the derivation of the trace formula demonstrates that the spectrum is based only on the axial periodic orbit and its repetitions. Experiments with microlasers illustrate the relation to periodic orbits. The methods presented in this paper are not limited to laser cavities and can be applied to a large range of wave systems.

Keywords: periodic orbit; semi-classical physics; lasers

Domains: Physics [physics]

A. Pascal, S. Bittner, B. Dietz, A. Trabattoni, C. Ulysse, et al.. Waves and rays in plano-concave laser cavities: II. A semiclassical approach. European Journal of Physics, 2017, 38 (3), pp.034011. ⟨10.1088/1361-6404/aa609d⟩. ⟨hal-01517504⟩