Misalignment sensitivity of the cat’s eye cavity He–Ne laser

A concave mirror and a cat’s eye reflector acting as a resonator mirror form the cat’s eye cavity. Misalignment sensitivities of the cat’s eye cavity and conventional resonator are both analyzed in geometric method and matrix optics with misalignment sensitivity parameter. Valuable conclusions are drawn: in full-external He–Ne laser, cat’s eye cavity can improve the laser stability up to about 60 times better than the conventional one; diffraction loss introduced by the misalignment of the cat’s eye cavity attributes to the straight-line displacement vertical to the laser bore of the cat’s eye reflector; and with the convex lens center of the cat’s eye reflector secured immobile, the ultra-stable and adjustment-free cat’s eye cavity He–Ne laser is obtained. The analysis matches the experiment results very well. Cavities with three kinds of dimension errors are also calculated. This paper could be used as theoretic foundation for the design and application of cat’s eye cavity lasers.