Zero-Order Phased Fiber Arrays
Phased arrays remain an important strategy for scaling average power and pulse energy in optical fiber lasers. In zero-order arrays, the lengths of the constituent lasers or amplifiers are matched to within the coherence length of a pulse; for fibers having bandwidths on the order of one nanometer, lengths must be matched to 1 mm; for fiber having bandwidths on the order of 30 nm (pulse duration of 100 fs), lengths must be matched to 30 {micro}m. The overarching goal of this work has been to demonstrate a scaling path to 10 mJ pulses from an array of fiber lasers, with each fiber contributing roughly 1 mJ of energy. The near term goals were, and remain, two-fold. First, to demonstrate that arrays of fiber amplifier chains can be created having path length differences on the order of sub-picoseconds. This has been accomplished, showing that sub-nanojoule, 200 fs pulses can be split into an array of four chains, each chain amplified with a single preamp, and the outputs can be recombined within the coherence length of the pulses. The second near term goal, stabilizing the phase through active feedback, is not yet complete. The strategy has been to generate an out-of-band CW seed signal that is monitored to account for fluctuations in path length that occur between pulses. At this point the necessary hardware is in place, but the control electronics are not. We expect the co-phasing work to continue under separate funding, though in a simpler form. Instead of combining pulses from many amplifiers we would combine many sequential pulses from a single fiber laser via a resonant cavity. Such a scheme is less expensive to build and test (and eventually, to field), though significant technical hurdles must be overcome, including the development of a low-loss mechanism for releasing the energy that is built up within the cavity.
- Research Organization:
- Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-7405-ENG-48
- OSTI ID:
- 974858
- Report Number(s):
- LLNL-TR-426235; TRN: US201008%%559
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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