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Title: High-resolution wavefront control of high-power laser systems

Abstract

Nearly every new large-scale laser system application at LLNL has requirements for beam control which exceed the current level of available technology. For applications such as inertial confinement fusion, laser isotope separation, laser machining, and laser the ability to transport significant power to a target while maintaining good beam quality is critical. There are many ways that laser wavefront quality can be degraded. Thermal effects due to the interaction of high-power laser or pump light with the internal optical components or with the ambient gas are common causes of wavefront degradation. For many years, adaptive optics based on thing deformable glass mirrors with piezoelectric or electrostrictive actuators have be used to remove the low-order wavefront errors from high-power laser systems. These adaptive optics systems have successfully improved laser beam quality, but have also generally revealed additional high-spatial-frequency errors, both because the low-order errors have been reduced and because deformable mirrors have often introduced some high-spatial-frequency components due to manufacturing errors. Many current and emerging laser applications fall into the high-resolution category where there is an increased need for the correction of high spatial frequency aberrations which requires correctors with thousands of degrees of freedom. The largest Deformable Mirrors currently availablemore » have less than one thousand degrees of freedom at a cost of approximately $1M. A deformable mirror capable of meeting these high spatial resolution requirements would be cost prohibitive. Therefore a new approach using a different wavefront control technology is needed. One new wavefront control approach is the use of liquid-crystal (LC) spatial light modulator (SLM) technology for the controlling the phase of linearly polarized light. Current LC SLM technology provides high-spatial-resolution wavefront control, with hundreds of thousands of degrees of freedom, more than two orders of magnitude greater than the best Deformable Mirrors currently made. Even with the increased spatial resolution, the cost of these devices is nearly two orders of magnitude less than the cost of the largest deformable mirror.« less

Authors:
; ; ; ; ; ;
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Defense Programs (DP) (US)
OSTI Identifier:
9797
Report Number(s):
UCRL-JC-134822; YN0100000; 98-ERD-061
YN0100000; 98-ERD-061; TRN: US0103197
DOE Contract Number:  
W-7405-ENG-48
Resource Type:
Conference
Resource Relation:
Conference: International Workshop on Adaptive Optics for Industry and Medicine, Durham (GB), 07/12/1999--07/16/1999; Other Information: PBD: 8 Jul 1999
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
42 ENGINEERING; ACTUATORS; DEGREES OF FREEDOM; INERTIAL CONFINEMENT; LASER ISOTOPE SEPARATION; LASER RADIATION; LASER BEAM MACHINING; MIRRORS; OPTICS; SPATIAL RESOLUTION; TEMPERATURE DEPENDENCE; BEAM DYNAMICS; CONTROL SYSTEMS

Citation Formats

Brase, J, Brown, C, Carrano, C, Kartz, M, Olivier, S, Pennington, D, and Silva, D. High-resolution wavefront control of high-power laser systems. United States: N. p., 1999. Web.
Brase, J, Brown, C, Carrano, C, Kartz, M, Olivier, S, Pennington, D, & Silva, D. High-resolution wavefront control of high-power laser systems. United States.
Brase, J, Brown, C, Carrano, C, Kartz, M, Olivier, S, Pennington, D, and Silva, D. 1999. "High-resolution wavefront control of high-power laser systems". United States. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/9797.
@article{osti_9797,
title = {High-resolution wavefront control of high-power laser systems},
author = {Brase, J and Brown, C and Carrano, C and Kartz, M and Olivier, S and Pennington, D and Silva, D},
abstractNote = {Nearly every new large-scale laser system application at LLNL has requirements for beam control which exceed the current level of available technology. For applications such as inertial confinement fusion, laser isotope separation, laser machining, and laser the ability to transport significant power to a target while maintaining good beam quality is critical. There are many ways that laser wavefront quality can be degraded. Thermal effects due to the interaction of high-power laser or pump light with the internal optical components or with the ambient gas are common causes of wavefront degradation. For many years, adaptive optics based on thing deformable glass mirrors with piezoelectric or electrostrictive actuators have be used to remove the low-order wavefront errors from high-power laser systems. These adaptive optics systems have successfully improved laser beam quality, but have also generally revealed additional high-spatial-frequency errors, both because the low-order errors have been reduced and because deformable mirrors have often introduced some high-spatial-frequency components due to manufacturing errors. Many current and emerging laser applications fall into the high-resolution category where there is an increased need for the correction of high spatial frequency aberrations which requires correctors with thousands of degrees of freedom. The largest Deformable Mirrors currently available have less than one thousand degrees of freedom at a cost of approximately $1M. A deformable mirror capable of meeting these high spatial resolution requirements would be cost prohibitive. Therefore a new approach using a different wavefront control technology is needed. One new wavefront control approach is the use of liquid-crystal (LC) spatial light modulator (SLM) technology for the controlling the phase of linearly polarized light. Current LC SLM technology provides high-spatial-resolution wavefront control, with hundreds of thousands of degrees of freedom, more than two orders of magnitude greater than the best Deformable Mirrors currently made. Even with the increased spatial resolution, the cost of these devices is nearly two orders of magnitude less than the cost of the largest deformable mirror.},
doi = {},
url = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/9797}, journal = {},
number = ,
volume = ,
place = {United States},
year = {Thu Jul 08 00:00:00 EDT 1999},
month = {Thu Jul 08 00:00:00 EDT 1999}
}

Conference:
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