Experimental Evidence of Subharmonic Bifurcations, Multistability, and Turbulence in a<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mml:mi>Q</mml:mi></mml:math>-Switched Gas Laser

Subharmonic bifurcations, generalized multistability, and chaotic behavior were found experimentally in a $Q$-switched C${\mathrm{O}}_{2}$ laser operating at 10.6 \ensuremath{\mu}m. Jumps between two strange attractors lead to a low-frequency ($\frac{1}{f}$ type) divergence in the power spectrum. This is the first experimental evidence of these phenomena in a quantum-optical molecular system. A theoretical model is also presented whose results are in good agreement with the experimental data.