Requirements for Laser Action

1- Two level system

2- Three level system
3- Four level system
 Two-level Laser System

 Unimaginable
 as absorption and stimulated processes neutralize one
another.
The material becomes transparent .
Even with very intense pump
source, the best one can achieve
with a two-level system is:
excited state population =
ground state population
 Three-level lasers
In three-level lasers, the atoms in the active medium have three
energy levels involved in the laser action
 Absorption raises the energy from level 1 to level
3 (this process is called pumping)
 Spontaneous decay (or non-radiative transition)
reduces the energy to level 2, which is a longer
lived or metastable state
 Stimulated emission occurs between levels 2 and
1
 The accumulation of excited atoms in the
metastable state results in population inversion
(compared to the ground state level 1).
 e.g. The ruby laser is an example of a three-
level laser in which the active species is the
chromium Cr 3+ ion
Ruby laser – three level system
Population inversion in a three-level laser
• The energy supply used to create the population
inversion is often referred to as a pump, which can
be light absorbed between a ground level E1 and an
excited level E3.
• If the excitation of this level is short-lived, and it
decays to a lower but longer-lived level E2
, the process leads to an accumulation and
overpopulation of atoms in level E2 compared with
E1. Stimulated emission, fed by energy from a
pump, is the essential process in a laser.
An effective three-level system satisfies the following conditions:
1- Population relaxation from level 3 to level 2 is very fast and
efficient, ideally

2- the atoms excited by the pump quickly end up in level 2

3- Level 3 lies sufficiently high above level 2 with

so that the population in level 2 cannot be thermally excited back

to level 3
4 - The lower laser level 1 is the ground state, or its population
relaxes very slowly if it is not the ground state.
Drawback of 3-LEVEL SYSTEM
The three-level system generally
requires very high pump powers
because the terminal state of the
stimulated transition is the ground
state. More than half the ground
state atoms must be pumped into the
metastable state to attain population
inversion.
Four-level Laser System
Laser transition takes place
between the third and second
excited states.
Rapid depopulation of
the lower laser level.
STEP 1- PUMPING: atoms are
excited to higher energy level by
providing energy from ext. source.
STEP 2- POPULATION INVERSION:
atom via radiation less decay,
decays to metastable state and
hence population inversion take
place.
STEP 3- LASER ACTION: atom from
metastable state decays to lower
state by stimulated emission and
hence laser action take place.
STEP 4- BACK TO GROUND STATE:
atom from excited state decays to
lower state by spontaneous
emission.
 A four-level system is more efficient than a
three-level system.
The lower laser level 1 lies sufficiently high
above the ground level 0, with ∆E10 >> kT Thus,
in thermal equilibrium, the population in level 1
is negligibly small
compared with that in level 0. Pumping takes
place from level 0 to level 3.
Levels 3 and 2 need to satisfy the same conditions as in
a three-level system.
 The population in level 1 relaxes very quickly back to
the ground level, ideally

So that level 1 remains relatively unpopulated in

comparison with level 2 when the system is pumped.

No minimum pumping requirement for an ideal

four-level system because level 1 is initially empty. A
practical four-level system is much more efficient than a
three-level system.
 Two-, three-, and four-level systems
It took laser physicists a while to realize that four-level systems are best.

Two-level Three-level Four-level

system system system

Fast decay
Fast decay
Pump
Pump Transition Transition Laser
Transition Transition
Laser
Pump
Transition
Transition
Fast decay

At best, you get equal

If you hit it hard, it
populations. No lasing. Lasing is easy!
can lase.