A fast cavity dumper for a picosecond glass laser

A fast cavity dumper for picosecond glass laser has been made. The optical and electrical characterization of the cavity dumper is described. An avalanche transistor Marx bank generator drives the cavity dumper. Up to 5 kV peak amplitude and 1.5 ns fall time negative polarity step pulses are generated by the Marx bank circuit. With a capacitive load like Pockels cell the pulse fall time increases to 4 ns. Optical switching times as fast as 2 ns (10%–90%) are experimentally measured. The contrast ratio of 1000 is obtained after a double pass through an amplifier. Single picosecond pulses are produced with an energy jitter of 10%.