Efficient 53 W cw laser at 559 nm by intracavity frequency summation of fundamental and first-Stokes wavelengths in a self-Raman Nd:GdVO_4 laser

We report the generation of 5.3 W cw laser emission at 559 nm by sum-frequency mixing of the fundamental and first-Stokes fields generated within an Nd:GdVO(4) self-Raman laser. A high overall diode-to-visible conversion efficiency of 21% is demonstrated. We discuss the balance that must be maintained between the two nonlinear processes of Raman generation and sum-frequency mixing in order to obtain maximum emission at 559 nm.