Smile correction using FAC lens deformation

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10627618-B2
Application number	US-201414476544-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 3, 2014
Priority date	Sep 3, 2013
Publication date	Apr 21, 2020
Grant date	Apr 21, 2020

Abstract

A system and method of providing a deformed FAC Lens to a multi-emitter diode bar laser system comprised of a lens holder and FAC lens wherein the FAC Lens is deformed so as to offset or compensate for the inherent smile properties present in a multi-emitter diode bar.

First claim

We claim:

1. A method of reducing the beam quality degradation of a multi-emitter diode bar within a light emitting diode laser system, comprising:
providing a multi-emitter diode bar comprising a plurality of diode emitters, wherein (i) at least two of the diode emitters are offset from each other and (ii) an output profile of the diode bar includes light emitted in a direction not perpendicular to a front face of the diode bar and/or light not emitted in a single plane emerging from the front face of the diode bar;
profiling an offset profile of each of a plurality of diode emitters within a multi-emitter diode bar;
determining a correlating lens profile which would direct any light emitted from each of the plurality of diode emitters into a desired output profile;
providing a planar lens that, when deformed to match the correlating lens profile, directs light into the desired output profile though an optical axis of the planar lens, wherein the planar lens has a bottom surface having a surface normal that is perpendicular to the optical axis;
providing a substrate;
adhering the bottom surface of the planar lens to an adhesion surface of the substrate, with one or more adhesive materials and without adhering the planar lens to the diode bar, to deform the planar lens to match the correlating lens profile, wherein the adhesion surface underlies an entirety of the lens; and
permanently fixing the planar lens, with the substrate proximate the diode bar such that light emitted by the diode emitters is transmitted through the optical axis of the planar lens into the desired output profile.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein adhering the planar lens to the adhesion surface of the substrate comprises:
placing at least two different adhesive materials each having a different coefficient of retraction between the substrate and the planar lens; and
curing the at least two different adhesive materials such that the planar lens is adhered to and pulled toward the substrate by the adhesive materials during curing so as to deform the lens into the correlating lens profile.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the adhesion surface on the substrate is contoured.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the adhesion surface of the substrate defines one or more mesas protruding above the substrate toward the lens, the one or more mesas providing support to the lens in order to match the lens' shape with the correlating lens profile.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
providing a layer of epoxy on the adhesion surface; and
non-uniformly curing the layer of epoxy thereby causing the planar lens to deform according to the correlating lens profile.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the adhesion surface defines a plurality of mesas protruding above the substrate toward the lens, at least one mesa varying in height or width from at least one other mesa.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the desired output profile causes the emission beams of the diode bar to be parallel with each other.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the desired output profile causes the emission beams of the diode bar to be in a non-parallel configuration.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the lens is adhered to the adhesion surface only at one or more discrete points, the lens not being adhered to an entirety of the adhesion surface.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein (i) the one or more adhesive materials comprises a plurality of different adhesive materials, and (ii) at least one adhesive material has a different coefficient of retraction than that of at least one other adhesive material.

11. A method of reducing the beam quality degradation of a multi-emitter diode bar, comprising:
providing a plurality of multi-emitter diode bars, each multi-emitter diode bar having a plurality of diode emitters;
measuring an offset profile of each of the plurality of diode emitters within each multi-emitter diode bar;
determining a set of profile markers for each multi-emitter diode bar, the set of profile markers being representative of deviations of the offset profiles of the diode emitters within each diode bar from a straight linear emission profile;
sorting each of the multi-emitter diode bars into a plurality of diode bar bins, each diode bar bin containing multi-emitter diode bars having profile markers within a common similarity threshold;
providing a plurality of lenses, each lens having a different lens profile; and
after providing the plurality of lenses, pairing each lens from the plurality of lenses to a corresponding diode bar bin,
wherein each paired lens has a lens profile designed to redirect light emitted from diode bars having offset profiles of each corresponding bin into a desired linear output profile.

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein providing the plurality of lenses comprises providing each of the lenses with a correlating lens profile via a process comprising:
providing a substrate;
placing at least two different adhesive materials each having a different coefficient of retraction onto the substrate and a placing a planar lens onto the two different adhesive materials; and
curing the at least two different adhesive materials such that the planar lens is adhered to and pulled toward the substrate by the adhesive materials during curing so as to deform the lens into the correlating lens profile.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein the lens is adhered to the substrate only at one or more discrete points, the lens not being adhered to an entirety of the substrate.

14. The method of claim 11 , wherein each of the plurality of lenses is formed using a forming step, the forming step of each lens comprising:
providing a substrate for each lens, the substrate having a contoured, non-planar adhesion surface; and
adhering the lens to the contoured, non-planar adhesion surface with one or more adhesive materials.

15. The method of claim 14 , wherein the contoured adhesion surface on the substrate for each lens defines one or more mesas, the one or more mesas providing support to the lens in order to maintain the lens' shape in a correlating lens profile.

16. The method of claim 14 , wherein the contoured adhesion surface defines a plurality of mesas, at least one mesa varying in height or width from at least one other mesa.

17. The method of claim 14 , wherein the lens is adhered to the adhesion surface only at one or more discrete points, the lens not being adhered to an entirety of the adhesion surface.

18. The method of claim 11 , wherein providing the plurality of lenses comprising adhering each lens to a corresponding substrate using an epoxy material.

19. The method of claim 18 , wherein the lens is adhered to the substrate only at one or more discrete points, the lens not being adhered to an entirety of the substrate.

20. The method of claim 11 , wherein providing the plurality of lenses comprises providing each of the lenses with a correlating lens profile via a process comprising:
providing a layer of epoxy on an adhesion surface of a substrate; and
non-uniformly curing the layer of epoxy thereby causing the lens to deform according to the correlating lens profile.

21. The method of claim 20 , wherein non-uniformly curing the layer of epoxy comprises applying a curing accelerant over only a portion of the adhesion surface of the substrate.

22. A diode laser assembly comprising:
a multi-emitter diode bar comprising an array of diode emitters and having a longitudinal plane,

Assignees

• Teradiode Inc

Inventors

• Deutsch Michael
• Wang Daqing

Classifications

• H01S5/005

  Optical components external to the laser cavity, specially adapted therefor, e.g. for homogenisation or merging of the beams or for manipulating laser pulses, e.g. pulse shaping (H01S5/026, H01S5/18388 take precedence) · CPC title

• H01S5/0014

  Measuring characteristics or properties thereof (measuring techniques per se G01J, G01K, G01N, G01R) · CPC title

• H01S5/4031 Primary

  Edge-emitting structures · CPC title

• G02B27/30

  Collimators · CPC title

• G02B27/0068

  having means for controlling the degree of correction, e.g. using phase modulators, movable elements (controlling the phase of light using moving or deformable elements G02B26/06) · CPC title