Self-mixing thin-slice solid-state laser Doppler velocimetry with much less than one feedback photon per Doppler cycle.

The drastic shortening of a photon lifetime as compared with normal TEM00 operations has been shown to be associated with the formation of annular mode operations in a thin-slice Nd:GdVO4 laser with tilted laser diode end pumping. The 15 dB enhancement of the signal-to-noise ratio, owing to the shortened photon lifetime, has been demonstrated in the self-mixing laser Doppler velocimetry experiment in comparison with the TEM00 operations, where the minimum intensity feedback rate from a target to the laser for successful measurements was estimated to be -123  dB, which corresponds to 0.007 photon per Doppler cycle.