Rapid calculation of the efficiency of self-terminating four-level Q-switched lasers.

We have developed a simple approach to deriving the efficiency of Q-switched four-level lasers, valid even for arbitrarily long lower laser level lifetimes. By eliminating time dependence from the calculation, numerical solutions can be obtained very rapidly. Its threshold and limiting slope efficiency values provide useful estimates for free-running pulsed four-level lasers as well as Q-switched.