Keith Kennedy

Laser-based SXGA reflective light valve projector with E-cinema quality contrast and color space

Laser light sources present many advantages for projection displays over the currently employed incoherent light sources. Perhaps the most significant attribute is the lasers high degree of polarization, which greatly improves the efficiency of liquid crystal light valve (LCLV) projectors. The maximum achievable efficiency of an LCLV projector is severely limited with the use of an unpolarized light source such as an arc lamp. The polarized emission from a laser can be coupled to the screen much more efficiently, offering the possibility of smaller projectors with higher luminous efficacies. Additionally, the RGB primaries of laser light fall along the spectrum locus of the chromaticity diagram allowing for a much expanded color gamut over dichroically-separated lamp spectra. This provides the possibility of offering unprecedented color reproduction for the emerging digital cinema industry. The combined properties of polarization, monochromaticity, and low divergence result in a significant increase in image contrast when coupled to LCLV image engines. Substituting lasers for lamp light sources have shown to increase sequential contrast by as much as five-fold. This simple substitution has also resulted in broad improvements to the projectors entire MTF, thereby increasing the apparent resolution of the image. These are all striking arguments as to the potential of lasers in the emerging e-cinema market and the impetuous behind our current development effort presented here.

High reliability of high power and high brightness diode lasers

We report on continued progress in the development of high power and high brightness single emitter laser diodes from 790 nm to 980 nm for reliable use in industrial and pumping applications. High performance has been demonstrated in nLIGHT’s diode laser technology in this spectral range with corresponding peak electrical-to-optical power conversion efficiency of ~65%. These pumps have been incorporated into nLIGHT’s fiber-coupled pump module, elementTM. We report the latest updates on performance and reliability of chips and fiber-coupled modules. This paper also includes a new chip design with significantly narrower slow-axis divergence which enables further improved reliable power and brightness. Preliminary reliability assessment data for these devices will be presented here as well.

Reliability of high power diode laser systems based on single emitters

Diode laser modules based on arrays of single emitters offer a number of advantages over bar-based solutions including enhanced reliability, higher brightness, and lower cost per bright watt. This approach has enabled a rapid proliferation of commercially available high-brightness fiber-coupled diode laser modules. Incorporating ever-greater numbers of emitters within a single module offers a direct path for power scaling while simultaneously maintaining high brightness and minimizing overall cost. While reports of long lifetimes for single emitter diode laser technology are widespread, the complex relationship between the standalone chip reliability and package-induced failure modes, as well as the impact of built-in redundancy offered by multiple emitters, are not often discussed. In this work, we present our approach to the modeling of fiber-coupled laser systems based on single-emitter laser diodes.

Wavelength stabilized diode laser based devices free of power or efficiency penalties

Spectrally-narrowed semiconductor laser diodes utilizing external volume gratings can be used to improve TEM00 power scaling and power conversion efficiency in diode-pumped solid state and fiber lasers. This approach is particularly attractive for pumping the narrow upper laser level of Nd:YAG DPSS lasers at 885 nm and the 1532 nm absorption band of Er:YAG DPSS lasers. While it is often believed that the use of such external gratings to wavelength lock diode lasers lead to unavoidable losses in power and efficiency, nLIGHTs proprietary laser designs and external volume grating integration techniques have eliminated these losses in our wavelength-locked diode laser products, enabling a broad range of spectrally locked laser diodes for pumping DPSS as well as fiber laser systems.

High-brightness, fiber-coupled pump modules in fiber laser applications

High-power, high-brightness, fiber-coupled pump modules enable high-performance industrial fiber lasers with simple system architectures, multi-kW output powers, excellent beam quality, unsurpassed reliability, and low initial and operating costs. We report commercially available (element™), single-emitter-based, 9xx nm pump sources with powers up to 130 W in a 105 μm fiber and 250 W in a 200 μm fiber. This combination of high power and high brightness translates into improved fiber laser performance, e.g., simultaneously achieving high nonlinear thresholds and excellent beam quality at kW power levels. Wavelength-stabilized, 976 nm versions of these pumps are available for applications requiring minimization of the gain-fiber length (e.g., generation of high-peak-power pulses). Recent prototypes have achieved output powers up to 300 W in a 200 μm fiber. Extensive environmental and life testing at both the chip and module level under accelerated and real-world operating conditions have demonstrated extremely high reliability, with innovative designs having eliminated package-induced-failure mechanisms. Finally, we report integrated Pump Modules that provide < 1.6 kW of fiber-coupled power conveniently formatted for fiber-laser pumping or direct-diode applications; these 19” rack-mountable, 2U units combine the outputs of up to 14 elements™ using fused-fiber combiners, and they include high-efficiency diode drivers and safety sensors.

High-power fiber-coupled diode lasers with superior brightness, efficiency, and reliability

Advances in high performance fiber coupled diode lasers continue to enable new applications as well as strengthen existing uses through progressive improvements in power and brightness [1]. These improvements are most notable in multi-kW direct diode systems and kW fiber laser platforms that effectively transform better beam quality into superior system performance and in DPSS (Diode pumped solid state) application striving to scale TEM00 (fundamental transverse mode) power. We report on our recent single-emitter based fiber-coupled product platform, the elementTM, that addressed these applications at 8xx/9xx nm with optical powers over 200W in a range of fiber core sizes down to 105um and 0.14NA (Numerical Aperture). The product is a culmination of numerous packaging improvements: improving wall plug efficiencies (~50% electrical-to-optical) while improving volume manufacturability, enabling lower costs, improving usable chip brightness by, < 20% over previous generation chips, and increasing the reliable output power to 15W per chip. We additionally report on current developments to extend the power of the product platform to as high as 300W. This will be realized primarily through new chip architectures projected to further increase the useable chip brightness by an additional 20 % and correspondingly scaling reliable output powers. Second order improvements are proposed in packaging enhancements that capitalize on the increased chip power and brightness as well as expand the package’s thermal capabilities. Finally, an extended performance roadmap will translate expected power advances and increasing volumes into a projection of relative

High-power blue laser for large-screen projectors

/W decreases over the next several years.

Next-generation industrial fiber lasers enabled by high-performance components

We describe a high-power blue laser for use in laser video projectors. The laser is based on an intra-cavity, frequency-doubled, Ti:sapphire resonator, longitudinally- pumped by a repetitively Q-switched 532 nm source. With 48 W of pump, the laser produces more than 7 W of continuously tunable blue output (430 <EQ (lambda) equals 460 nm) with a pulse width of 80 ns and a beam quality factor M2 equals 2.2. The applicability of this high-power laser as a source of monochromatic blue light for different large-screen laser displays is also discussed.

Reduced-mode (REM) diodes enable high brightness fiber-coupled modules

Next-generation industrial fiber lasers enable challenging applications that cannot be addressed with legacy fiber lasers. Key features of next-generation fiber lasers include robust back-reflection protection, high power stability, wide power tunability, high-speed modulation and waveform generation, and facile field serviceability. These capabilities are enabled by high-performance components, particularly pump diodes and optical fibers, and by advanced fiber laser designs. We summarize the performance and reliability of nLIGHT diodes, fibers, and next-generation industrial fiber lasers at power levels of 500 W – 8 kW. We show back-reflection studies with up to 1 kW of back-reflected power, power-stability measurements in cw and modulated operation exhibiting sub-1% stability over a 5 – 100% power range, and high-speed modulation (100 kHz) and waveform generation with a bandwidth 20x higher than standard fiber lasers. We show results from representative applications, including cutting and welding of highly reflective metals (Cu and Al) for production of Li-ion battery modules and processing of carbon fiber reinforced polymers.

High-brightness diodes and fiber-coupled modules

There is an increasing demand for high-power, high-brightness diode lasers from 8xx nm to 9xx nm for applications such as fiber laser pumping, materials processing, solid-state laser pumping, and consumer electronics manufacturing. The kilowatt CW fiber laser pumping (915 nm - 976 nm), in particular, requires the diode lasers to have both high power and high brightness in order to achieve high-performance and reduced manufacturing costs. This paper presents continued progress in the development of high brightness fiber-coupled product platform, elementTM. Further brightness improvement and power-scaling have been enabled by both the rise in chip brightness as well as the increase in number of chips used to couple into a given numerical aperture. We have developed a new generation of high power broad area laser known as reduced-mode diode (REM-diode) which suppresses many of the higher order modes in the slow axis and reduces divergence up to two times at the same operating conditions. To date, we have achieved slow-axis brightness as high as 4.3 W/mm-mrad for devices with thermal resistance of ~2.5 C/W. As a result, we have achieved >75 watts from a 1×6 elementTMin the 9xx nm spectral range; and 177 watts of peak power from a 2×6 elementTM. We have also improved our optics for fiber-coupling which accommodates 7 emitters per polarization in the same numerical aperture. Using this configuration, we project 200 watts of peak power from a 2×7 elementTM with a reliable product at 176 W of power from 105 μm and 0.15 NA fiber. REM-diodes can also be wavelength stabilized using VBGs. The reliability of REM-diodes are equal or better than broad area lasers (BALs). We present current status on ongoing reliability assessment of chip-on-submount.