Optimization of a chirped-pulse amplification Nd:glass laser

To allow us to achieve the highest focused intensity from a chirped-pulse amplification Nd:glass laser, a number of features of the system have been considered and optimized. These include the compressor geometry, the system aberrations, and the use of mixed glasses in the amplifier chain. Calculations for the laser with a single- or double-pass pulse compressor with 450-mm gratings are presented. These indicate that, for single pass, a reduction in pulse duration from 380 to 237 fs is possible when a phosphate is changed to a mixed phosphate-silicate glass system, and there is a corresponding increase of 44% in peak intensity at beam focus.     

Photo-thermo-refractive glass co-doped with Nd as a new laser medium

Photo-thermo-refractive (PTR) glass demonstrates refractive index change after exposure to UV radiation followed by a thermal treatment that enables recording of high efficiency holographic optical elements. This work demonstrates feasibility of function of this material as a complex optical medium which posseses both photosensitive and luminescent properties and paves a way for creation of monolythic solid state lasers where resonator components can be holographically recorded inside of a laser medium. It was found, that incorporating of Nd³⁺ ions in PTR glass does not affect photosensitivity required for hologram recording. It was demonstrated that emission wavelength, spectral width, and cross section of Nd³⁺ luminescence in PTR glass are typical for silicate laser glasses and Nd-doped PTR glass can be considered as a promising laser medium for monolithic solid state lasers.     

Nd:YAG激光辐照碳纤维复合材料的质量烧蚀

通过实验研究了连续Nd:YAG激光辐照下碳纤维环氧树脂复合材料的质量烧蚀规律.结果表明:当激光功率密度大于10 kW/cm2时,材料烧蚀质量与激光辐照能量成正比关系;在同样激光辐照能量下,半径为0.65 mm的激光辐照引起的复合材料的质量烧蚀率比半径为5.5 mm的激光辐照的结果大一倍;激光功率在燃烧阈值附近时,燃烧现象引起质量烧蚀率的波动.     

Trident: a versatile high-power Nd:glass laser facility for inertial confinement fusion experiments

The Trident Nd:glass laser system operates as an experimental facility supporting the national Inertial Confinement Fusion program at Los Alamos. The laser has two identical main beam lines with 14-cm-disk final amplifiers. The beams are frequency doubled, expanded to 19.2 cm, and focused on target with a variety of focusing optics. A third beam with 10-cm disk final amplifiers is also frequency doubled and used as a target-shooting or diagnostic beam simultaneously with the other two beams.

The facility provides a flexible combination of energy, pulse-shaping capabilities, and diagnostic tools for laser-target interaction experiments.

     

Diffractive interconnection between a high-power Nd:YAG laser and a fiber bundle

Beam splitters are used to couple the light of high-power Nd:YAG lasers into a fiber bundle. By the fibers the light is delivered to the workstations in the factory. This technique is used to reduce the costs of the light and to simplify the logistics within the fabrication process. Typically, dielectric beam splitters are used. However, they suffer from a polarization-sensitive splitting ratio. Because the polarization content of a high-power Nd:YAG-laser is not constant in time, polarization-independent beam splitters are of concern. The feasibility of diffractive beam splitters is investigated.     

Multipass reconfiguration of the HELEN Nd:glass laser at the Atomic Weapons Establishment

The HELEN high-power Nd:glass laser has been rebuilt in a new multipass configuration that requires fewer components to maintain existing performance. This is expected to lead to greater system availability and reduced running costs. We describe the new design, discuss some of the key issues that had to be addressed, and present operational results.     

Development of a chirped pulse amplification laser with zigzag slab Nd:glass amplifiers dedicated to x-ray laser research

A chirped pulse amplification laser with zigzag slab Nd:glass amplifiers dedicated to x-ray laser research is described. The laser provides a 1.6 ps duration pulse with approximately 7 J energy at a repetition rate of 0.1 Hz. In the power amplifier system, laser light is amplified in a two-step manner: The first step is image-relayed multipass amplification up to approximately 1 J with a 10 mm x 10 mm beam. The second step is double-pass amplification up to >10 J with a 10 mm x 90 mm beam. By using this laser system, the saturated amplification of the Ni-like Ag laser at a wavelength of 13.9 nm has been successfully demonstrated.     

Crystal growth induced by Nd:YAG laser irradiation in patterning glass ceramic substrates with dots

In this work a glass ceramic substrate was processed by focusing a laser beam inside the said material. The crystal phase within the amorphous matrix provides mechanical properties to the glass ceramic substrate in such a way that dots can be patterned inside the fore-mentioned material without producing any cracks. These marks are made up of crystals, the growth of which has been induced by the laser beam. These inner structures can modify the optical, thermal and mechanical properties of the glass ceramic substrate.A Q-switched Nd:YAG laser at its fundamental wavelength of 1064 nm with pulsewidths in the nanosecond range has been used.Morphology, composition, microstructure, mechanical and thermal properties of the processed material are described.     

Performance of a prototype for a large-aperture multipass Nd:glass laser for inertial confinement fusion

The Beamlet is a single-beam prototype of future multibeam megajoule-class Nd:glass laser drivers for inertial confinement fusion. It uses a multipass main amplifier, adaptive optics, and efficient, high-fluence frequency conversion to the third harmonic. The Beamlet amplifier contains Brewster-angle glass slabs with a clear aperture of 39 cm x 39 cm and a full-aperture plasma-electrode Pockels cell switch. It has been successfully tested over a range of pulse lengths from 1-10 ns up to energies at 1.053 mum of 5.8 kJ at 1 ns and 17.3 kJ at 10 ns. A 39-actuator deformable mirror corrects the beam quality to a Strehl ratio of as much as 0.4. The 1.053-mum output has been converted to the third harmonic at efficiencies as high as 80% and fluences as high as 8.7 J/cm(2) for 3-ns pulses.     

Laser-diode-pumped Nd:YAG active-mirror laser

We describe a simple design, laser-diode-pumped cw Nd:YAG active-mirror laser and present a thermal analysis of the crystal. A cw output power of 2.4 W and an M(2) beam quality value of less than 1.9 at an incident pumping power of 8.9 W were obtained. From the thermal analysis we predict that the output power can be increased by increasing the pump beam diameter and the pump power at a constant excitation density.     

Dual-wavelength self-Q-switched Nd:GYSGG laser

A dual-wavelength self-Q-switched operation of Nd:GYSGG laser with different output couplers is proposed and demonstrated. In self-Q-switched operation, two laser lines between 1056.86 nm and 1060.23 nm were found. Under the pump power of 4 W, the shortest pulse width of 2.02 μs was obtained with a maximum average output power of 565 mW and the optical conversion efficiency of 14.13%. The pulse repetition rate and single pulse energy were 50.2 kHz and 11.25 μJ, respectively. The system is very stable and suitable for generation of multi-wavelength pulses.     

Segment side-pumped Q-switched Nd:YAG laser

In the design of conduction-cooled lasers, a side-pumped configuration is an attempt to solve the space conflict between pump and heat removal. The pump radiation always competes with the heat removal and mechanical support device for the lateral surface of a laser rod. This space conflict can be addressed by a segment side-pumped configuration in which circular laser diode arrays and heat-conducting rod holders alternate periodically along the length of the laser rod. This scheme permitted 11 Hz operation of a 190 mJ Q-switched laser at the wavelength of 1064 nm without the use of liquid cooling for both the laser rod and laser diode arrays and the corresponding optical-optical conversion efficiency of 23.1%. Thus, it has great potential to be used in compact and miniature laser systems.     

Quasi-flat-top frequency-doubled Nd:glass laser for pumping of high-power Ti:sapphire amplifiers at a 0.1 Hz repetition rate

A Nd:glass laser based on a novel design delivers up to 120 J energy pulses with a quasi-flat-top spatial profile at a 0.1 Hz repetition rate. The laser output is frequency-doubled with 50% efficiency and used to pump Ti:sapphire amplifiers. The developed design is perspective for use in the currently contemplated next step in ultra-high-intensity laser development.     

Fabrication of polycrystalline silicon thin films on glass substrates using fiber laser crystallization

Laser crystallization of amorphous silicon (a-Si), using a fiber laser of λ = 1064 nm wavelength, was investigated. a-Si films with 50 nm thickness deposited on glass were prepared by a plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition. The infrared fundamental wave (λ = 1064 nm) is not absorbed by amorphous silicon (a-Si) films. Thus, different types of capping layers (a-CeO_x, a-SiN_x, and a-SiO_x) with a desired refractive index, n and thickness, d were deposited on the a-Si surface. Crystallization was a function of laser energy density, and was performed using a fiber laser. The structural properties of the crystallized films were measured via Raman spectra, a scanning electron microscope (SEM), and an atomic force microscope (AFM). The relationship between film transmittance and crystallinity was discussed. As the laser energy density increased from 10-40 W, crystallinity increased from 0-90%. However, the higher laser density adversely affected surface roughness and uniformity of the grain size. We found that favorable crystallization and uniformity could be accomplished at the lower energy density of 30 W with a-SiO_x as the capping layer.     

Single-mode fluorotellurite glass fiber

By multi-stage rod-in-tube fiber drawing process, a single-mode fluorotellurite glass fiber was fabricated and reported for the first time. Benefiting from chemical–physical dehydration process to remove water and OH⁻ groups, the propagation loss was decreased to 1.9 dB/m at 1550 nm and the infrared window is extended from 2.8 μm to 4.2 μm, i.e. a new kind of mid-infrared glass fiber. The fiber is with a small core of 3.52 μm in diameter to meet single-mode condition, and the effective nonlinear parameter γ was estimated to be 236.7 W⁻¹ km⁻¹ at 1550 nm by using continuous-wave self-phase modulation method. © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.     

Spectroscopic analysis of a novel Nd3+-activated barium borate glass for broadband laser amplification

Spectroscopic parameters of a novel Nd³⁺-activated barium borate (BBONd) glass have been analyzed for broadband laser amplification. The Judd–Ofelt (JO) intensity parameters were determined through a systematic analysis of the absorption spectrum of Nd³⁺ ions in the BBONd glass. High values of the JO intensity parameters reveal a great centro-symmetrical loss of the Nd³⁺ sites and high covalency degree of the ligand field. The very high Ω₆ intensity parameter value makes evident both a great structural distortion of the Nd³⁺ sites and a strong electron–phonon coupling between Nd³⁺ and free OH⁻ ions, which is consistent with the phonon energy maximum (3442.1 cm⁻¹) recorded by Raman spectroscopy. This strong electron–phonon coupling favors high effective bandwidth and gain bandwidth values of the laser emission (⁴F_3/2 → ⁴I_11/2) of Nd³⁺ ions. The electric-dipole oscillator strengths of all the Nd³⁺ absorption transitions, and in particular that of the hypersensitive transition (⁴I_9/2 → ⁴G_5/2), are enhanced by this great structural distortion of the host. Broadband laser amplification of the ⁴F_3/2 → ⁴I_11/2 emission (1062 nm) of Nd³⁺ ions in the BBONd glass pumped at 805 nm (⁴I_9/2 → ⁴F_5/2 + ²H_9/2) is evaluated through the main fluorescent parameters in competition with non-radiative processes. In general, the BBONd glass exhibits spectroscopic parameters comparable with those reported in the literature for broadband laser amplification into the IR region.