Investigation of Top-Seeded Solution Growth Kinetics of ß-BBO Crystal

Modern high temperature crystal growth is a science which was greatly developed during WWII for the growth of large pure silicone and germanium single crystals, desperately needed for the development of the essential RADAR systems. By the end of the war, the body of knowledge in high temperature crystal growth was large. In the early sixties the solid state laser was developed, followed by twenty years in which much effort was invested into growing laser crystals. By the beginning of 1980's researchers from the Fujian Institute of Research realized that the low temperature phase of barium borate crystal may be exploited for high power lasers. The crystal known as the ¿-Barium Borate (¿-BBO) crystal, is important for its high power applications in frequency doubling, OPO and Q-switching. In the many years that have passed since its introduction, it was found that growing sufficiently long ¿-BBO crystals is difficult due to the growth process prematurely terminating. In the current text, the complicated and complex phenomena involved in crystal growth are illustrated. The author introduces some surprising conclusions regarding the growth process of this specific crystal.