Abstract:
A glaze encapsulated solid-state laser component (30). The novel laser component (30) includes a core (10) and a cladding (32) of ceramic glaze disposed on a surface of the core (10). In an illustrative embodiment, the core (10) is fabricated from a laser gain medium and the cladding material is a multi-oxide eutectic ceramic glaze having a refractivity slighter lower than the refractivity of the gain medium, such that the glaze layer forms a step-index refractivity interface cladding that can effectively suppress parasitic oscillations in the core gain medium. The glaze cladding (32) can be applied by coating the core (10) with the glaze and then firing the glaze coated core, or by fabricating pre-formed cladding strips from the ceramic glaze in a first firing cycle, mounting the pre-formed strips to the core (10), and then fusing the pre-formed strips to the core (10) in a secondary firing cycle.
Abstract:
Methods and constructions for cryogenically cooled solid state lasers are provided that allow the cooling channels to be embedded within the heat sinks used to conductively cool the laser medium. Several gain medium geometries are disclosed that are compatible with efficient and straight forward cryogenic cooling techniques using practical pump chamber designs while eliminating the need for the pump light to traverse the cryogenic layers and allowing for smooth temperature cycling. A number of active material configurations that can be generally adapted for pumping by high power diodes - including slab, thin disk, active mirror and rod geometries - are shown to be compatible with the cryogenic cooling approaches of the invention. Modeling results based on the preferred cooling configurations indicate substantial improvement in the performance of common solid state lasers, including Nd and Yb-doped lasers.
Abstract:
An edge-pumped solid state thin slab laser apparatus is disclosed that is power scalable to well over 150 W for either multimode or near single transverse mode operation. A slab thickness is selected that is small enough to minimize thermal effects for a straight through beam yet large enough to allow efficient direct coupling of pump light from high power diode array stacks while also keeping the gain to within manageable levels for pulsed operation. Cooling of the slab is provided conductively, preferably by contact with metal blocks of high thermal conductivity. The edge-pumped solid state thin slab laser provides a near-one dimensional temperature gradient and heat flow direction that is perpendicular to the laser signal plane of propagation. The width of the slab is selected so as to maximize pump absorption length for a given laser material and both one and two-sided pumping schemes can be accommodated by the basic slab laser platform, depending on power, mode and beam quality requirements. The output power from the edge-pumped thin slab is generally scalable with slab length and the power available from diode array stacks used to pump the slab. The broad faces of the slab comprising the active medium may be coated with a material that is reflective at the pump wavelength or the slab can be sandwiched between two layers of dielectric of lower index of refraction so as to allow guiding of the pump light for better homogenization of the absorption, and hence the gain profile.
Abstract:
An integrated photonic apparatus that includes a glass substrate having a major surface, wherein the glass substrate includes a pllurality of regions (110, 120, 130, 340, 380, 323), each region having a different index of refracton, including a first region having a first index of refraction and a second region having a second index of refraction lower than the first index of refraction, and a first waveguide (140, 240, 340) formed along the major surface of the substrate, wherein the first waveguide has a higher index of refraction than an intrinsic index of refraction of adjacent protions of the substrate, and wherein the first waveguide passes through the first region and through the second region of the glass substrate.
Abstract:
A concentrator including a volume of at least partially transmissive material and a plurality of facets disposed at at least one surface thereof. Each of the facets is disposed at a position dependent angle relative to the surface effective to cause an internal reflection of energy applied to the layer whereby the density of the applied energy varies as a function of position. In the illustrative implementation, the volume is an active medium, i.e., a slab. The slab has substantially parallel, planar upper and lower surfaces and first and second edges therebetween. A plurality of cladding layers are disposed on the upper and lower surfaces of the slab. The facets are provided in the cladding layers on the upper and lower surfaces of the slab and angled as a function of distance relative to the first or the second edge. The facets provide a Fresnel reflecting surface or a binary optic surface.
Abstract:
An upconversion active gain medium including an oxyde crystal host doped with two groups of active ions capable of producing either blue or ultraviolet lasing radiation at room temperature from single band infrared pumping radiation that is continuous or quasi-continuous is disclosed. An upconversion micro-laser (1) incorporating a chip (10) of said upconversion active gain medium, an optical cavity (20) for resonating at least said lasing radiation and a small size pumping source (30) is disclosed too. The pumping radiation energy is applied to the crystal host by means of a beam or a set of beams of said pumping radiation to be absorbed by sensitizer ions and provide the energy transfer to the activator ions. The crystal host is made of a new class of materials the composition thereof being arranged to be compatible with the preferable upconversion mechanism for increasing efficiency and providing stability and reproducibility of the micro-laser parameters. Said crystal host may be arranged to produce said lasing radiation at one of the wavelengths preferably using additionally a red or an infrared exciting radiation having been produced also by said crystal host itself during the upconversion process. Besides, a structure of the crystal host may be arranged to produce said lasing radiation being polarized.
Abstract:
The inventive rod includes a gain medium having first and second equal length portions (110) sharing a common optical axis and an optical rotator (101) disposed between said first and second portions which optical rotator compensates for birefringence. In an exemplary case, the optical rotator includes first (101a) and second (101b) waveplates optically coupled to one another and oriented with respect to one another by a predetermined angle, where the first waveplate receives a polarized beam having a first state, and the second waveplate produces the polarized beam having a second state, the first and second states differing from one another by 90 DEG . Multiple rotators can be employed to compensate strongly birefringent rods, each rotator compensating a section of a rod constructed from a plurality of equal length optical gain elements.
Abstract:
A passively Q-switched laser (110) is pumped by a first optical input signal (101) to produce a train of optical pulses (102) at a first wavelength. These pulses are then fed into a gain-switched (120) laser. The absorption of energy at the first wavelength induces gain in the cavity (160) of the gain-switched laser (120) at a second wavelength, resulting in the spontaneous generation of an optical output pulse (103) at a preferred eye-safe wavelength.