Title: gas laser Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - gas laser DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.G02585 Status: current Definition A laser in which the active medium is a gas containing a laser active species. It is typically composed of a plasma discharge tube containing a gas that can be excited with an electric discharge. Related Terms - active medium: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/A00106 - active species: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/A00110 - laser: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/L03459 Source - PAC, 1995, 67, 1913. 'Nomenclature, symbols, units, and their usage in spectrochemical analysis-XV. Laser-based molecular spectroscopy for chemical analysis - laser fundamentals (IUPAC Recommendations 1995)' on page 1919 (https://doi.org/10.1351/pac199567111913) Related Reference - PAC, 1996, 68, 2223. 'Glossary of terms used in photochemistry (IUPAC Recommendations 1996)' on page 2244 (https://doi.org/10.1351/pac199668122223) Other Outputs - html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/G02585/html - json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/G02585/json - xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/G02585/xml Citation: Citation: 'gas laser' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.G02585 License: The IUPAC Gold Book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) for individual terms. Collection: If you are interested in licensing the Gold Book for commercial use, please contact the IUPAC Executive Director at executivedirector@iupac.org . Disclaimer: The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) is continuously reviewing and, where needed, updating terms in the Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the IUPAC Gold Book). Users of these terms are encouraged to include the version of a term with its use and to check regularly for updates to term definitions that you are using. Accessed: 2026-05-28T05:35:34+00:00