Behaviors of random laser in dye-doped nematic liquid crystals

Random lasing in the nematic liquid crystals (NLCs) with a high doping concentration of the laser dye was observed and characterized. With increasing the pump energy after the occurrence of the random laser (RL), the RL intensity first increases gradually to a maximum, then drops sharply to zero, accompanied by the gradual enhancement of scattering manifested by the growth of far-field diffraction rings of the transmitted pump beam in number. The threshold energy per unit pump area, slope efficiency, and maximal output intensity of the NLC RL depend heavily and nonmonotonically on the pump angle. A model involving the pump pulse induced molecular reorientation in NLCs leading to the pump angle dependent enhancement of scattering is proposed to explain the pump angle dependent properties of RLs.