Selective Repositioning and Rotation Wavelength Beam Combining System and Method

• US 20110216417A1
• Filed: 03/07/2011
• Published: 09/08/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 03/05/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Panasonic Corporation Of North America (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Original Assignee: TeraDiode, Inc. (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Inventors: Huang, Robin, Chann, Bien
• Granted Patent: US 8,553,327 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 359/618
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 19/0014 at least one surface having optical power
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 19/0028 refractive and reflective surfaces, e.g. non-imaging catadioptric systems
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 19/0057 in the form of a laser diode array, e.g. laser diode bar semiconductor laser arrays with beam combining arrangement H01S5/4012
• CPC Class Codes: G02B 27/0905 Dividing and/or superposing multiple light beams
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 2301/03 Suppression of nonlinear conversion, e.g. specific design to suppress for example stimulated brillouin scattering [SBS], mainly in optical fibres in combination with multimode pumping
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/06733 Fibre having more than one cladding
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/0675 Resonators including a grating structure, e.g. distributed Bragg reflectors [DBR] or distributed feedback [DFB] fibre lasers
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/094053 Fibre coupled pump, e.g. delivering pump light using a fibre or a fibre bundle
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/094057 by tapered duct or homogenized light pipe, e.g. for concentrating pump light
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/09408 Pump redundancy
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/094096 Multi-wavelength pumping
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/09415 the pumping beam being parallel to the lasing mode of the pumped medium, e.g. end-pumping
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/1618 ytterbium
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/175 phosphate glass
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 3/176 silica or silicate glass
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 5/0057 for temporal shaping, e.g. pulse compression, frequency chirping
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 5/4012 Beam combining, e.g. by the use of fibres, gratings, polarisers, prisms
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 5/405 Two-dimensional arrays
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 5/4062 with an external cavity or using internal filters, e.g. Talbot filters
• CPC Class Codes: H01S 5/4087 emitting more than one wavelength

Abstract

A system and method for reconfiguring a plurality of electromagnetic beams to take advantage of various wavelength beam combining techniques. The reconfiguring of beams includes individual rotation and selective repositioning of one or more beams with respect to beam'"'"'s original input position.

Claims

1. A wavelength beam combiner comprising:

an optical rotator configured to selectively rotate beams emitted by a plurality of laser elements;

a transform optic configured to receive and combine the selectively rotated beams along a beam combining dimension; and

a dispersive element positioned to receive and transmit the combined beams, wherein an output profile is formed.

2. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 1, further including:

an output coupler configured to receive the output profile from the dispersive element and reflect a portion of the output profile back into the laser elements.

3. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 1, wherein at least two of the laser elements have a fixed-position relationship.

4. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 1, wherein the laser elements include a first reflective surface and an optical gain medium.

5. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 1, further including a collimation optic configured to receive beams from the laser elements and collimate one or more beams along a dimension of the beam.

6. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 1, further including a spatial repositioning element configured to spatially-reposition one or more beams prior to being received by the transform lens.

7. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 1, wherein the emitted beams have an asymmetrical profile.

8. A wavelength beam combiner comprising:

a spatial repositioning element configured to spatially-reposition beams emitted by a plurality laser emitters;

a transform optic arranged to receive the spatially-repositioned beams and combine the beams along a beam combining dimension; and

a dispersive element positioned at a region of overlap of the combined beams to receive and transmit the combined beams.

9. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 8, further including an optical coupler configured to reflect a portion of the beams back into the laser elements.

10. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 8, wherein the plurality of laser elements produces a two-dimensional profile and the spatial-repositioning element reduces the number of beams along a first dimension while increasing the number of beams across a second dimension.

11. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 8, wherein at least two of the laser elements have a fixed-position relationship.

12. The wavelength beam combiner of claim 8, further including an optical rotator configured to selectively rotate beams prior to being received by the transform optic.

13. A wavelength beam combining method including:

selectively rotating electromagnetic beams emitted by a plurality of laser elements;

combining the selectively rotated beams along a beam combining dimension; and

transmitting the combined beams as a single output.

14. The method of claim 13, further including:

individually collimating the emitted beams along a dimension prior to selectively rotating the beams.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein at least two of the laser elements have a fixed-position relationship.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein all of the beams are rotated in a range of 80 to 90 degrees.

17. A method for wavelength beam combining including:

selectively-repositioning electromagnetic beams emitted by a plurality of laser elements;

combining the selectively-repositioned beams along a beam combining dimension; and

dispersing the combined beams with a dispersive element.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the plurality of laser elements produces a two-dimensional profile and the selectively-repositioning step reduces the number of beams along a first dimension while increasing the number of beams across a second dimension.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein an array of periscopes is used in the selectively-repositioning step.