Large deformable mirrors for beam control of high brightness lasers

Abstract

<strong>Adaptive Optics</strong> is now a standard feature to control the laser beam quality of the high power lasers facilities. The development of the next generation of high power and high brightness laser facilities comes along with the increase of the energy of the laser pulses. In these lasers, the size of the optical elements used at the end of the chain must be increased in order to withstand the higher energy of the laser pulses. Laser adaptive optics systems are based on the use of deformable mirrors and are usually located at the end of the laser chain. Therefore, along with the other optics, the size of the deformable mirror must be increased in order to withstand the energy of the laser. <strong>Mechanical deformable mirror</strong> technology is compatible with all the standard high power dielectric coatings and is easily scalable. Large mechanical deformable mirrors able to withstand high pulse energies can be manufactured without technological obstacle. We present characterization and beam shaping results obtained with two large mechanical deformable mirrors. One mirror has a 180mm circular clear aperture. The other is an <strong>elliptical</strong> deformable mirror with 270 x 190mm clear aperture and is used as a fold mirror at 45° incidence. These large deformable mirrors can withstand pulse energies around 10 kilojoules for chirped pulses. They are compatible with the needs of beam shaping and beam control of the next generation of high power and high brightness laser facilities.