Spatial rogue waves in a Q-switched solid-state laser with transverse mode locking

Abstract

Spatial rogue waves represent hot spots with extremely high intensities in transverse cross-section of the laser beam. Here, we study theoretically the generation of spatial rogue waves in an actively Q- switched solid-state laser with several transverse modes. We show that in the absence of nonlinear mode interaction and other nonlinear effects in the cavity spatial rogue waves in the output laser beam can be generated as a result of coherent superposition of the transverse modes. The probability of rogue wave emergence depends on the laser mode configuration and is higher in the case of highly anisotropic mode distribution and reduced frequency spacing between the modes.