Method and system for processing optical materials for high power laser systems

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-8945440-B2
Application number	US-201113240980-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 22, 2011
Priority date	Sep 24, 2010
Publication date	Feb 3, 2015
Grant date	Feb 3, 2015

Abstract

A method of determining conditioning pulse parameters for an optical element includes directing a pump pulse to impinge on the optical element and directing a probe pulse to impinge on the optical element. The method also includes determining a first time associated with an onset of electronic excitation leading to formation of an absorbing region of the optical element and determining a second time associated with expansion of the absorbing region of the optical element. The method further includes defining a turn-off time for a conditioning pulse between the first time and the second time. According to embodiments of the present invention, pulse shaping of the conditioning pulse enables laser conditioning of optical elements to achieve improvements in their laser induced damage threshold.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of determining conditioning pulse parameters for an optical element, the method comprising:
directing a pump pulse to impinge on the optical element;
directing a probe pulse to impinge on the optical element;
determining a first time associated with an onset of electronic excitation leading to formation of an absorbing region of the optical element;
determining a second time associated with expansion of the absorbing region of the optical elem…

Assignees

• Demos Stavros G
• Raman Rajesh
• Negres Raluca A
• L Livermore Nat Security Llc

Inventors

• Demos Stavros G
• Raman Rajesh
• Negres Raluca A

Classifications

• G01N21/59 Primary

  Physics · mapped topic