Design for a compact tunable Ti:sapphire laser.

Tunable laser radiation with megahertz linewidth is generated with a simple, inexpensive, and compact laser system that uses two common microscope slides as the only intracavity tuning elements. The laser emits two radiation modes whose frequencies are separated by 1.2 GHz, corresponding to the free spectral range of the laser resonator. The frequencies may be rapidly varied over a range of 1.5 GHz at a rate of 2 GHz/s.