Methods for Mitigating Growth of Laser-Initiated Surface Damage on Fused Silcia Optics at 351nm
We report a summary of the surface damage, growth mitigation effort at 351nm for polished fused silica optics. The objective was to experimentally validate selected methods that could be applied to pre-initiated or retrieved-from-service optics, to stop further damage growth. A specific goal was to obtain sufficient data and information on successful methods for fused silica optics to select a single approach for processing large aperture, fused-silica optics used in high-peak-power laser applications. This paper includes the test results and the evaluation thereof, for several mitigation methods for fused silica surfaces. The mitigation methods tested in this study are wet chemical etching, cold plasma etching, CW-CO{sub 2} laser processing, and micro-flame torch processing. We found that CW-CO{sub 2} laser processing produces the most significant and consistent results to halt laser-induced surface damage growth on fused silica. We recorded successful mitigation of the growth of laser-induced surface damage sites as large as 0.5mm diameter, for 1000 shots at 351nm and fluences in the range of 8 to 13J/cm{sup 2}, {approx}11ns pulse length. We obtained sufficient data for elimination of damage growth using CO{sub 2} laser processing on sub-aperture representative optics, to proceed with application to large aperture ({approx}40 x 40cm{sup 2}) fused silica.
- Research Organization:
- Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- US Department of Energy (US)
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-7405-ENG-48
- OSTI ID:
- 15002010
- Report Number(s):
- UCRL-JC-144295; TRN: US200408%%30
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: XXXIII Annual Symposium on Optical Materials for High Power Lasers, Boulder, CO (US), 10/01/2001--10/03/2001; Other Information: PBD: 12 Dec 2001
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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