Confocal optical scanning system employing a fiber laser
First Claim
1. A confocal optical scanning system for scanning an object, said system comprising:
- a) a flexible optical fiber laser having a lasing cavity and being driven by a pump source to generate a probe beam;
b) a reflecting means in said fiber laser for defining a first end of said lasing cavity;
c) an output coupling means in said fiber laser for defining a second end of said lasing cavity and for out-coupling said probe beam;
d) beam shaping means for focusing said probe beam on a scan point on or within said object and focusing a signal beam reflected from said scan point such that said signal beam is in-coupled into said second end of said lasing cavity;
e) a transducer for detecting an optical perturbation in said lasing cavity; and
f) a scanning means for moving said scan point relative to said object.
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Abstract
A confocal optical scanning system using a flexible optical emissive fiber or fiber laser and having a lasing cavity defined within the fiber. The system in-couples a signal beam produced when a probe beam generated by the fiber laser is reflected from a scanned object back into the lasing cavity. The perturbation created in the cavity by the in-coupling of the signal beam is detected by a transducer. Specifically, the perturbation may be the signal beam itself, an oscillation mode of the cavity induced by the in-coupled signal beam or a combination of the signal beam and the probe beam. In a preferred embodiment of the invention the system also has a polarizing assembly for altering a signal polarization of the signal beam and rotate it to either a resonant polarization supported by the cavity or a non-resonant polarization not supported by the cavity.
342 Citations
62 Claims
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1. A confocal optical scanning system for scanning an object, said system comprising:
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a) a flexible optical fiber laser having a lasing cavity and being driven by a pump source to generate a probe beam; b) a reflecting means in said fiber laser for defining a first end of said lasing cavity; c) an output coupling means in said fiber laser for defining a second end of said lasing cavity and for out-coupling said probe beam; d) beam shaping means for focusing said probe beam on a scan point on or within said object and focusing a signal beam reflected from said scan point such that said signal beam is in-coupled into said second end of said lasing cavity; e) a transducer for detecting an optical perturbation in said lasing cavity; and f) a scanning means for moving said scan point relative to said object. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41)
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42. A confocal optical scanning system for scanning an object, said system comprising:
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a) a flexible optical emissive fiber being driven by a pump source and a seed source to generate a probe beam; b) a first end of said emissive fiber for in-coupling a seed beam from said seed source; c) a second end of said emissive fiber for out-coupling said probe beam; d) pump coupling means for coupling a pump beam from said pump source into said emissive fiber; e) beam shaping means for focusing said probe beam on a scan point on or within said object and focusing a signal beam reflected from said point such that said signal beam is in-coupled into said second end of said emissive fiber; f) a transducer for detecting said signal beam in said emissive fiber; and g) a scanning means for moving said scan point relative to said object. - View Dependent Claims (43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62)
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Specification