ABSTRACT

Stimulated Raman and stimulated Brillouin scattering are inelastic scattering processes in which light at a laser or pump wavelength is converted into light at another wavelength, accompanied by the excitation or deexcitation of an internal mode of the medium. Stimulated Brillouin scattering occurs in solids, liquids, gases, and plasmas. Stimulated Raman scattering can be divided into three temporal regimes: steady state, transient, and broadband stationary. The Raman gain for various polarization depends on the symmetry of the Raman transition, and is governed by the depolarization ratio. For many materials and transitions the maximum gain occurs for pump and Stokes polarizations that are linear and parallel. The growth of Stokes light from noise in a single-pass generator is properly described with a quantum mechanical treatment. Stimulated Brillouin scattering is commonly used for phase conjugation, backward wave amplification, and pulse compression.