A new ray tracing method for the propagation of electrical fields in inhomogeneous and weakly anisotropic media is presented. With this method, we can efficiently simulate the propagation of laser beams in solid-state laser amplifiers, which suffer from high thermal loads. As a result of this method, we can find optical compensation setups that significantly reduce the depolarization losses in high-power solid-state amplifiers. To the best of our knowledge, we theoretically demonstrate for the first time that [100]-cut YAG crystals reduce the depolarization by more than a magnitude in comparison to [111]-cut crystals while achieving an overall better beam quality at the same time.

中文翻译：

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热加载固态激光晶体中的偏振射线追踪

提出了一种在不均匀和弱各向异性介质中传播电场的新的射线追踪方法。使用这种方法，我们可以有效地模拟激光束在固态激光放大器中的传播，因为固态激光放大器承受着很高的热负荷。这种方法的结果是，我们可以找到光学补偿装置，该装置可大大降低大功率固态放大器中的去极化损耗。据我们所知，我们在理论上首次证明了[100]切割的YAG晶体与[111]切割的晶体相比，将去极化降低了一个数量级以上，同时实现了总体上更好的光束质量。