Open Competition 1 - Electronics and Photonics

Specialty Fiber for High-Power Fiber Lasers

Sponsor: OFS Fitel, LLC

• Project Performance Period: 10/1/2004 - 9/30/2006
• Total project (est.): $5,665,775.00
• Requested ATP funds: $2,000,000.00

Nearly fifty years after the first one, lasers of all types continue to find more and more applications, ranging from materials processing and medical and industrial spectroscopy to remote sensing and ranging and a wide variety of scientific instruments. Benefits span all aspects of science and technology and better laser performance will result in unforeseen applications of optical physics. While there has been steady progress in the development of solid-state lasers, the technology is facing some fundamental limits, particular in average beam power and pulse rate. Fiber-based lasers - a technology almost as old as lasers themselves - are reemerging as a promising alternative to conventional lasers for some applications. Fiber lasers, in which the amplifying or lasing medium is a specially formulated and designed optical fiber, theoretically can overcome the limitations of conventional solid-state lasers in beam quality, pulse repetition rate and average power. In addition, fiber lasers have the potential to be compact, rugged, efficient and offer low cost of ownership. Improved performance will allow greater penetration into existing markets and enable new applications. Despite great promise, however, breakthroughs in several areas of optical fiber design are required to provide the quantum improvement in performance necessary for large-scale introduction. In particular, problems with energy storage in the gain medium and nonlinear optical effects in the fiber limit the use of fiber lasers for pulsed, high-power applications. The key is to increase the effective area of the laser amplifying portion of the fiber while suppressing energy losses to unwanted frequencies that normally increase as area increases. OFS Fitel proposes a two-pronged approach to the problem: a radical fiber design which alters the waveguiding nature of the fiber to achieve higher effective areas and novel fiber designs that require precise control of the composition and structure of the optical fiber during production. Both developments will require new glass fiber fabrication methods that allow superior control of glass composition, higher damage thresholds and higher efficiency, and OFS also proposes novel processing techniques to achieve this. The new processing methods developed by OFS as part of this ATP project will have far-ranging spillover benefits for many types of specialty fiber in addition to laser fiber. The market for advanced, high-power pulsed lasers, while broad, is fragmented into many highly specialized, low-volume applications. As a result, fiber production is highly customized and the lack of standardization has increased fiber cost and impeded fiber development. Research into novel fiber technology has been discouraged by the relatively high R&D risk for any individual market segment. ATP funding removes these barriers and will be instrumental in uniting the diverse applications for the benefit of all. The anticipated new products from this program are novel fibers and fiber-based components as well as "gain block" subassemblies which are the critical, defining components of fiber lasers. While OFS commercialized similar components years ago, this new technology will allow quantum improvement in laser performance.

For project information:

Sherry Salyer, (770) 798-4210
shsalyer@ofsoptics.com

ATP Project Manager

Eric Samuelson, (301) 975-6393
eric.samuelson@nist.gov