Polarization anisotropy of diffraction losses on CW laser cavity misalignment

We have investigated the influence of diffraction losses arising on tilts of stable and unstable cavity mirrors on the polarization of multimode and single-mode continuous lasers. This influence was compared with the influence on multimode radiation polarization of a tilted plate with known anisotropy. It has been found that the anisotropy of the mirror misalignment due to the difference in Fresnel reflection coefficients is not sufficient to explain the high degree of radiation polarization. Besides the anisotropy of reflection losses, there is also anisotropy of the diffraction losses at the edge of the misaligned mirror. These diffraction and Fresnel reflection anisotropies determine the laser radiation polarization at tilted cavity mirrors.