The future of solid state lasers

Martin Richardson Townes Laser Institute, College of Optics & Photonics University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida mcr@creol.ucf.edu

June 21, 2011

The first laser a ruby laser

May 17, 1960

Q-switching the invention that nearly killed it all!

Vernueil Process

Czochralski process

The age of glass lasers

Flashlamp-pumped pulsed crystalline lasers eventually limited by laser material size and damage threshold. Crystal size limited by boule diameters. Dopant ~ 1% Maximum Nd:YAG rod diameter ~ 1 cm. Damage thresholds ~ 20 J/cms Repetition rates 1- 10 Hz. Limited by heat deposition. Nd- doped glass

Amplifiers use 3,072 42-kg neodymiumdoped phosphate glass slabs, measuring 3.4 by 46 by 81 cms

Solid state lasers at the end of the 80s

Flashlamp pumping kept commercial solid state systems to low powers. Largely pulsed regime. Low repetition-rates, ~ 100s Hz heating, flashlamp recycling time, Low efficiencies (<1%), poor pumplight coupling Low powers (< 100W av), limited by thermal loading, costs

Enter the 90s the age of diode pumping

808 nm pumping for Nd:YAG LLNL 50 kW diode array ..940 nm pumping for Yb:YAG even better 10.5% for Yb:YAG

Renewed interest in crystalline lasers - 100 x higher thermal shock resistance - higher thermal conductivity Average powers jump from 100Ws to KW Efficiencies increase 100s fold to 20-30%

Diodes enable new pump architectures

Rod type architecture Thin disc architecture

Trumpf

JHPSL Northrop Grumman 100 kW SSDPL

To be deployed at HELSTF summer 2011

Trumpf markets 16 kW thin disc DP SSL

Trumpf

High power fiber lasers

Rapid development of commercial systems (IPG, SPI, Nufern, ) Single mode powers of ~ 1 kW.

IPG Nufern SPI

BEAM COMBINING Multiple beam tiling Coherent Beam Combining Spectral Beam Combining

25 kW

Diode pumping also enabled SS ultrafast

Newport -Spectra

CW DPSL (2) pumped Ti:Sapphire Regenerative and multi-pass Ti:Sapphire amplifiers pumped by DP or flashlamp pumped SSls Pulse durations 50 -500 fs Pulse energies < 10 mJ Repetition rates 1 kHz 100 kHz
Amplitude Coherent

The limits of todays technologies

High power SS lasers
Created a near-$B market in high power lasers for manufacturing.
Reaching limitations in high power architecture imposed by thermal loading and single crystal host. Beam quality and thermal loading primary constraints. Yb:YAG the most efficient SS laser material. Cryogenic Yb:YAG offering improvements in thermal dissipation. Rapid rise in high power fiber laser market ( $100Ms/year). Efficiency and cost important drivers. Mode size limiting maximum power. Component development (couplers, isolators..).

High power fiber lasers

Ultrafast lasers
Ti:Sapphire based systems limited market penetration. Power (rep.rate), cost, complexity and efficiency. Lack of identified single large market.

Tomorrow New transformative technologies

New Laser Materials
Polycrystalline materials transparent ceramics New laser host materials. New SSL architectures New infra-red laser materials. High powers in the Mid IR

New Pump Sources

Currently limited to near IR high power diodes Visible and UV diode sources high power 15XX nm and 19XX nm diode sources

New Fiber Architectures

LMA fiber designs. Holey fiber and HOM designs New fiber preform and fabrications techniques

Next generation of ultrafast lasers

Fiber-based systems. Increased reliability, efficiency Reductions in cost, complexity, footprint. Manufacturing market-leverage development

Tomorrow New transformative technologies

New Laser Materials
Polycrystalline materials transparent ceramics New laser host materials. New SSL architectures New infra-red laser materials. High powers in the Mid IR

New Pump Sources

Currently limited to near IR high power diodes Visible and UV diode sources high power 15XX nm and 19XX nm diode sources

New Fiber Architectures

LMA fiber designs. Holey fiber and HOM designs New fiber preform and fabrications techniques

Next generation of ultrafast lasers

Fiber-based systems. Increased reliability, efficiency Reductions in cost, complexity, footprint. Manufacturing market-leverage development General trend to monolithic integrated functionality light engines of the future

Single Crystal Growth

High Temperature Growth from Melt

Ceramic Process
Low Temperature Powder Processing
Sinter/Densify
(Add sintering aid) Gas Grains containing rare earth ions

Goal: Single crystal One large grain No grain boundaries

RE doped powder

Hot Press

HIP

Transparent Polycrystalline Ceramic Many small grains Grain boundaries

crack
Split

Low temperature (<70% Tm) processing avoids high temp issues (eg phase transitions) Grain boundaries more accommodating to additional lattice strain: Potential for higher RE doping and uniformity Scalability to large sizes & complex shapes High ruggedness and toughness

Difficult to grow crystals from high temperature melt: Compositional variations Crucible interactions Phase transitions (strain cracking) Poor RE solubility and uniformity Size limitations Low yield

Traditional limitations are overcome with Polycrystalline Ceramic

Cannot grow large crystals or complex shapes from best crystalline materials

Ish Aggarwal NRL

Fabrication of transparent laser ceramics

Nano-powder synthesis (wet-chemistry, spray pyrolysis) CRITICAL STEPS Powder handling (de-agglomeration, blending) Powder shaping (cold pressing, slip casting) Binder burn-out, pre-sintering Pressureless Sintering Field Assisted Sintering Hot-uniaxial pressing Sinter-HIP

Hot-Isostatic Pressing (Ar, >150 MPa) Post-sintering heat-treatments (annealing, re-crystallization) spinel

Milestones on the ceramic laser road

100 kW 67 kW

2006 2011

Ceramic Nd:YAG large sizes - bonded materials

Konoshima LLNL

Improvements in Nd:YAG ceramic laser power

102 101 106 105

Attenuation coefficient (cm-1)

Maximum Laser Power (W)

10

104 103

10-1 102 10-2 101 10-3 10-4 10-5 1980 100 10-1 10-2 2010

1985

1990

1995

2000

2005

Develop of ceramic laser materials will be driven also by other applications.

Next generation nuclear scintillators Large IR-transmitting windows

Medical imaging

Homeland Security

Preliminary diffusion bonded SPINEL samples (3 x 3 x ) showing excellent bonding Sangera, NRL

Scintillator Ceramics
Scintillator Applications

Bruno Viana

Property Comparison with Other Materials

Property Measurements Optical Absorption Coefficient (ppm cm-1 at 1.06 m) Refractive Index (at 1.06 m) dn/dT (/K) at 633 nm Stress Optic Coefficient (/Pa) Mechanical Density (g/cm3) Poissons Ratio Hardness (kg/mm2) Fracture Strength (MPa) Youngs Modulus (GPa) Thermal Thermal Expansion Coeff. (/K) Heat Capacity Cp (J/g/K) Thermal Conductivity (W/(m.K) 0.5x10-6 0.74 1.38 14.9x10-6 0.67 0.7 5.9 x 10-6 0.604 13.4 2.2 0.17 600 50 74.5 3.75 0.31 500 (est) 102 69.6 3.58 0.27 1645 350 271 12 1.45 1.2x10-5 3.4x10-13 75 1.45 -9.2x10-6 4.1x10-13 6 1.707 2.3 x10-5 3x10-13 Fused Silica OFG Glass SPINEL

Aggawal & Sanghera

SPINEL compared to Fused Silica:
2x lower absorption coefficient > 2.5x harder and 7x stronger 10x higher thermal conductivity

SPINEL compared to OFG glass:

>10x lower absorption coefficient 3x stronger and > 3x harder 3x lower CTE 20x higher thermal conductivity

Engineered Laser Ceramics

Example of a non-uniform doping Transverse doping profile geometry scalable to multiple kW

R. Gaume Stanford

Engineered Laser Ceramics

Fabrication of dopant-engineered ceramics
Non-reactive sintering:
Cold-pressing, Slip-casting, Tape-casting

Reactive sintering:
Cold-pressing, Slip-casting, Tape-casting

Bonding of bulk materials:

Ceramic ceramic bonding Ceramic single crystal bonding

Courtesy of A. Ikesue

Anisotropic Ceramic Materials - A new class of ceramics

Magnetic orientation of rare earth-doped diamagnetic material RE: Ca10(PO4)6F2 (RE:Nd, Yb) FAP Interaction between spin-orbit momentum of f-electrons and host material under an applied magnetic field. Crystal orientation of ceramics For Yb:FAP (002) and (004) planes corresponded to c-plane: (003) plane corresponded to a-plane For Nd:FAP (003) plane corresponded to c-plane:

2T applied during slip casting

Absorption and Emission spectra Strongly axis-dependent c-axis/a-axis absorption coefft 1.3 C-axis/a-axis emission ~ 1.43

Akayama, Sato & Tiara, Adv. Solid State Lasers, Denver 2009

New fiber laser technologies

New fiber designs
Rod-type PCF fibers

New IR fiber lasers

NKT Photonics

Nufern New LMA fiber designs

High power tunable, all-fiber 2m Tm fiber laser. C-R 790 nm pumping 200 pm linewidth LPL, Townes Institute

For the future: 100 kW class fiber lasers? High power mid- IR fiber laser? Polycrystalline (ceramic) fiber lasers? Single crystal fiber lasers?

New ultra-fast lasers

New Geometries
OPCPA systems. Hybrid amplifier technologies Quasi- single cycle, CEP.
IMRA

Amplitude

New compact high power fiber lasers

Rugged low cost systems Initial niche market applications Many new start-up companies

Raydiance

New laser component technologies

New high power dispersive optics Optics for phase control
fractive optical elements
Direction of translation

beam engineering

Focusing element DOE

Glass sample

Volume Bragg gratings Glebov, Optigrate Guided-mode Resonant Waveguide Layer Filters Johnson, UNCC
Diffractive Array of Holes

Input writing beam

5 mm 5 mm

Summary
A new era in SS laser technology
Light engines of the future Approaching light-bulb efficiencies Monolithic integrated architectures

New laser sources and materials

ceramic lasers New infra-red materials Diode pump sources in the visible and mid-IR

New laser modalities

Phase and Spectral beam combining Phase and mode control multi-pulse and multi-wavelength regimes

Many new application areas

Precision machining for electronics, medical, aeronautics SSL enter medical therapy, imaging and surgery Multiple applications in the defense and security fields

Investments so far in the Townes Institute

Major Investment in Optical Fibers and Fiber Fabrication > $2M investment in fiber fabrication facilities operational 2011 3 new faculty in optical fiber design, fabrication and applications
Asst Prof. Ayman Abouraddy Quantum Optics Multi-functional fibers. Mid-IR. Prof. Axel Schulzgen Multi-structured fibers. Fiber lasers. Fibers for sensing. Multi-functional fibers. Mid-IR. Asst Res. Prof. Rodrigo Amezcua-Correa Photonic crystal fibers High temperature silica fibers. Fiber lasers

Townes Institute moves into Attoscience Prof. Zenghu Chang moved to UCF 2010 from KSU. Joint position with Physics Department. Critical mass in femtosecond lasers, High Harmonic Generation, EUV and attoscience 2010- 2011 Ceramic Laser Materials Initiative Asst. Prof. Romain Gaume from Stanford to join in Summer 2011. Relocation of Stanford ceramics laboratory to UCF. Appointment of 1-2 Research professors.

Martin Richardson
mcr@creol.ucf.edu www.townes.ucf.edu www.lpl.creol.ucf.edu