Linewidth reduction of a broad-area laser diode array in a compound external cavity

Abstract

A compound external cavity is designed and implemented to achieve a homogeneous spectrum distribution of broad area laser diodes in an array and to narrow the spectral linewidth of the entire array. The compound external cavity is composed of an optical coupler and a Littrow external cavity with a telescope along the fast axis. The inhomogeneous distribution of individual laser diodes spectrum generated by the "smile" effect was reduced by the telescope. The effective transverse coupling among individual laser diodes in an array was enhanced by the optical coupler, which further reduced the spectrum inhomogeneous distribution of the entire array. The spectral linewidth of a 49-emitter laser array is reduced to 0.1 nm at the output power of 12.5 W.