We report an experimental study of the 1064nm transition dipoles in neodymium doped yttrium aluminum garnet (Nd-YAG) by measuring the coupling constant between two orthogonal modes of a laser cavity for different cuts of the YAG gain crystal. We propose a theoretical model in which the transition dipoles, slightly elliptic, are oriented along the crystallographic axes. Our experimental measurements show a very good quantitative agreement with this model, and predict a dipole ellipticity between 2% and 3%. This work provides an experimental evidence for the simple description in which transition dipoles and crystallographic axes are collinear in Nd-YAG (with an accuracy better than 1 deg), a point that has been discussed for years.
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