Comparative Analyses of Spherically Symmetric Unstable Optical Resonators with Circular Apertures

Abstract

We calculate power losses in unstable optical resonators which are used in medium-to-high power lasers. The main contribution of this paper is to use some methods usually adopted in the field of antenna and propagation to analyse the unstable optical resonators. These methods are physical optics (PO), scalar theory of diffraction (STD), physical theory of diffraction (PTD), approximate physical optics (POA), and geometrical theory of diffraction plus geometrical optics (GTD+GO). In these methods the vector nature of the field is retained. These methods are used to analyze spherically symmetric unstable optical resonators with circular apertures. The results of these different methods are compared with each other and with previously published calculations.