Laser Beam Uniformity Research Articles

Spatial autocorrelation study for laser beam quality estimation

High brightness electron beam is required by several applications in the accelerator physics field. In order to have a high brightness beam, that means a high current and a low emittance beam, it is important to study, among other things, the beams non uniformity due to the non perfect transverse laser beam uniformity. Regarding the transverse analysis of the beam, statistical tools as mean and standard deviation are usually used. In this work we will show how the autocorrelation function of a photocathode laser can be used for monitoring the spatial distribution of the beam non-uniformity, strictly connected with the high electron beam emittance: we will apply our analysis on the SPARC_LAB data.

Optimising of the material and laser parameters for high-power laser spatial beam smoothing based on stimulated Brillouin scattering

In this paper, we numerically study the influence of material and laser parameters on laser spatial beam uniformity improvement based on stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS). Owing to the intensity dependent property of SBS, the higher intensity parts of the laser beam experience a deep reflection, while the other parts transmit through the medium with weak reflection. Then, the uniformity of the input laser beam is improved. A single frequency laser with a 20th order super-Gaussian shaped output pulse was used as the pump. Five typical liquid materials were adopted as the Brillouin medium for comparison. The laser wavelength was set to 527 nm and 1053 nm; and the pulse duration was set to 3 ns and 5 ns, respectively. The numerically calculated results indicate that low gain coefficient and short phonon lifetime mediums (such as FC-70) are more suitable for the above-mentioned laser beam smoothing scheme. Meanwhile, short wavelength and pulse duration would be helpful for laser beam uniformity improvement. The energy efficiency is above 90% when the laser beam uniformity is greatly improved with an optimized input laser intensity. The calculated results are quite useful for high-power laser applications.

Laser-Plasma Interactions in Drive Campaign targets on the National Ignition Facility

The Drive campaign [D A Callahan et al., this conference] on the National Ignition Facility (NIF) laser [E. I. Moses, R. N. Boyd, B. A. Remington, C. J. Keane, R. Al-Ayat, Phys. Plasmas 16, 041006 (2009)] has the focused goal of understanding and optimizing the hohlraum for ignition. Both the temperature and symmetry of the radiation drive depend on laser and hohlraum characteristics. The drive temperature depends on the coupling of laser energy to the hohlraum, and the symmetry of the drive depends on beam-to-beam interactions that result in energy transfer [P. A. Michel, S. H. Glenzer, L. Divol, et al, Phys. Plasmas 17, 056305 (2010).] within the hohlraum. To this end, hohlraums are being fielded where shape (rugby vs. cylindrical hohlraums), gas fill composition (neopentane at room temperature vs. cryogenic helium), and gas fill density (increase of ∼ 150%) are independently changed. Cylindrical hohlraums with higher gas fill density show improved inner beam propagation, as should rugby hohlraums, because of the larger radius over the capsule (7 mm vs. 5.75 mm in a cylindrical hohlraum). Energy coupling improves in room temperature neopentane targets, as well as in hohlraums at higher gas fill density. In addition cross-beam energy transfer is being addressed directly by using targets that mock up one end of a hohlraum, but allow observation of the laser beam uniformity after energy transfer. Ideas such as splitting quads into “doublets” by re-pointing the right and left half of quads are also being pursued. LPI results of the Drive campaign will be summarized, and analyses of future directions presented.

Radial smoothing for improving laser-beam irradiance uniformity.

Laser-beam irradiation uniformity is a key issue in inertial confinement fusion research. We propose a radial smoothing (RS) approach in which the speckle in a focal plane is smoothed by the radial redistribution through fast focal zooming. This focal zooming is generated by introducing the periodical spherical wavefront modulation to the laser beam, based on an optical Kerr medium and its pump laser with the temporal profile of a Gaussian pulse train. The utilization of RS significantly improves the laser-beam uniformity without obvious impact on the performance of the high-power laser system.

Fresnel diffraction and small-scale self-focusing of a phase modulated and spectrally dispersed laser beam

To unravel the propagation properties of the phase modulated and spectrally dispersed (PM-SD) beam in the inertial confinement fusion lasers, we investigated theoretically and numerically the Fresnel diffraction of the PM-SD beam after passing a hard-edged aperture and small-scale self-focusing (SSSF). It is found that the Fresnel diffraction pattern of the PM-SD beam can be significantly changed and the laser beam uniformity can be improved by choosing appropriate PM-SD beam's parameters. The diffraction field of the PM-SD beam has a slower growth than the monochromatic laser beam when the beams suffer from SSSF. The PM-SD beam can be applied to improve the beam uniformity and suppress or delay the onset of SSSF in the high power laser system.

광열고압 충격현상에 대한 예비 실험

A high power laser beam focused on a small area accelerates a thin material that flies and hits other target material in which a shock wave may be induced. This laser induced shock experimental method is more repeatable and cheaper but worse than other experimental method using gas gun or other apparatus. An optical system including a phase zone plate reduces the interference and also makes the focused-beam-intensity distribution uniform. We wrote a computer code that calculates light ray traces. Using the code we designed and fabricated an optical system including a phase zone plate and improved the laser-beam uniformity. We introduce preliminary experimental results of laser induced shock of the samples such as aluminum and other materials.

Micro-uniformity during laser anneal : metrology and physics

ABSTRACTMaintaining or improving device performance while scaling semiconductor devices, necessitates the development of extremely shallow (< 20 nm) source/drain extensions with a very high dopant concentration and electrical activation level. Whereas solutions based on RTA with cocktail implants have been proposed in previous generations, sub-45 nm technologies will require even shallower junctions which motivates the research effort on milli-second anneal approaches as these hold the promise of minimal diffusion coupled with high activation levels [1]. Laser annealing is one of these concepts proposed to achieve the junction specifications and is typically described as a msec anneal process. Different from lamp based concepts which illuminate a full wafer simultaneously, the laser has an illuminated area which is much smaller than the wafer size thus necessitating a dedicated scanning pattern. In such a case one is potentially faced with areas subject to multiple overlaps and/or different temperatures and thus issues related to within wafer and within die uniformity need to be addressed.In this work we use optimized metrology to probe such macro- and micro non-uniformity and determine the origin of the various components contributing to the observed non-uniformity patterns (laser stitching patterns, laser beam uniformity, optical path) and their impact on the local sheet resistance.

Improved far-field laser-beam uniformity using the air turbulence disturbed light

Air turbulence is introduced to disturb the laser-beam before irradiating multi-step phase plates (MPP), which improve the light uniformity irradiation in the focal plane. The far-field character of the disturbed wavefront with and without MPP has been studied including the effects of large-scale phase fluctuations. Simulation results indicate that the intensity distribution can be smoothed by using the new method with the remaining flat-top profile on target plane after a period of accumulation.

Development of the indirect-drive approach to inertial confinement fusion and the target physics basis for ignition and gain

Inertial confinement fusion (ICF) is an approach to fusion that relies on the inertia of the fuel mass to provide confinement. To achieve conditions under which inertial confinement is sufficient for efficient thermonuclear burn, a capsule (generally a spherical shell) containing thermonuclear fuel is compressed in an implosion process to conditions of high density and temperature. ICF capsules rely on either electron conduction (direct drive) or x rays (indirect drive) for energy transport to drive an implosion. In direct drive, the laser beams (or charged particle beams) are aimed directly at a target. The laser energy is transferred to electrons by means of inverse bremsstrahlung or a variety of plasma collective processes. In indirect drive, the driver energy (from laser beams or ion beams) is first absorbed in a high-Z enclosure (a hohlraum), which surrounds the capsule. The material heated by the driver emits x rays, which drive the capsule implosion. For optimally designed targets, 70%–80% of the driver energy can be converted to x rays. The optimal hohlraum geometry depends on the driver. Because of relaxed requirements on laser beam uniformity, and reduced sensitivity to hydrodynamic instabilities, the U.S. ICF Program has concentrated most of its effort since 1976 on the x-ray or indirect-drive approach to ICF. As a result of years of experiments and modeling, we are building an increasingly strong case for achieving ignition by indirect drive on the proposed National Ignition Facility (NIF). The ignition target requirements for hohlraum energetics, radiation symmetry, hydrodynamic instabilities and mix, laser plasma interaction, pulse shaping, and ignition requirements are all consistent with experiments. The NIF laser design, at 1.8 MJ and 500 TW, has the margin to cover uncertainties in the baseline ignition targets. In addition, data from the NIF will provide a solid database for ion-beam-driven hohlraums being considered for future energy applications. In this paper we analyze the requirements for indirect drive ICF and review the theoretical and experimental basis for these requirements. Although significant parts of the discussion apply to both direct and indirect drive, the principal focus is on indirect drive.

Anticipated improvement in laser beam uniformity using distributed phase plates with quasirandom patterns

The uniformity of focused laser beams, that has been modified with randomly phased distributed phase plates [C. B. Burckhardt, Appl. Opt. 9, 695 (1970); Kato and Mima, Appl. Phys. B 29, 186 (1982); Kato et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 53, 1057 (1984); LLE Rev. 33, 1 (1987)], can be improved further by constructing patterns of phase elements which minimize phase correlations over small separations. Long-wavelength nonuniformities in the intensity distribution, which are relatively difficult to overcome in the target by thermal smoothing and in the laser by, e.g., spectral dispersion [Skupsky et al., J. Appl. Phys. 66, 3456 (1989); LLE Rev. 36, 158 (1989); 37, 29 (1989); 37, 40 (1989)], result largely from short-range phase correlations between phase plate elements. To reduce the long-wavelength structure, we have constructed phase patterns with smaller short-range correlations than would occur randomly. Calculations show that long-wavelength nonuniformities in single-beam intensity patterns can be reduced with these masks when the intrinsic phase error of the beam falls below certain limits. We show the effect of this improvement on uniformity for spherical irradiation by a multibeam system.

Improved laser-beam uniformity using the angular dispersion of frequency-modulated light

A new technique is presented for obtaining highly smooth focused laser beams. This approach is consistent with the constraints on frequency tripling the light, and it will not produce any significant high-intensity spikes within the laser chain, making the technique attractive for the high-power glass lasers used in current fusion experiments. Smoothing is obtained by imposing a frequency-modulated bandwidth on the laser beam using an electro-optic crystal. A pair of gratings is used to disperse the frequencies across the beam, without distorting the temporal pulse shape. The beam is broken up into beamlets, using a phase plate, such that the beamlet diffraction-limited focal spot is the size of the target. The time-averaged interference between beamlets is greatly reduced because of the frequency differences between the beamlets, and the result is a relatively smooth diffraction-limited intensity pattern on target.

Channel Integrator For Laser Beam Uniformity On Target

High power lasers tend to have significant spatial intensity structure across their pupils. Some high power applications, however, require nearly uniform intensity distributions at some plane of interest. Channel integrators offer a relatively simple and cost-effective means of making this conversion.