The second fusion of laser and aerospace—an inspiration for high energy lasers

Since the first laser was invented, the pursuit of high-energy lasers (HELs) has always been enthusiastic. The first revolution of HELs was pushed by the fusion of laser and aerospace in the 1960s, with the chemical rocket engines giving fresh impetus to the birth of gas flow and chemical lasers, which finally turned megawatt lasers from dream into reality. Nowadays, the development of HELs has entered the age of electricity as well as the rocket engines. The properties of current electric rocket engines are highly consistent with HELs’ goals, including electrical driving, effective heat dissipation, little medium consumption and extremely light weight and size, which inspired a second fusion of laser and aerospace and motivated the exploration for potential HELs. As an exploratory attempt, a new configuration of diode pumped metastable rare gas laser was demonstrated, with the gain generator resembling an electric rocket-engine for improved power scaling ability.