Project: Novel IR-laser source for active spectroscopy and medical applications
There is a key roadblock to practical mid-Infrared lasers and spectroscopic systems and their exploitation in numerous sensing, diagnostic, microscopy, environmental monitoring, medical and materials processing applications; there is a lack of compact and practical pump lasers. The NovIRLas project will address this important issue by developing a novel hybrid semiconductor-dielectric pump laser that will fill this gap and prove itself as a pump platform in two distinct, applications-focused work strands – the next generation of surgical lasers (1.9-2.2µm) and a complete hyperspectral mid-IR (MIR) imaging and detection system._x000D_The worldwide market for sub-kW MIR (2-15µm) lasers was ~$310M in 2010 and is anticipated to grow to $560M by 2014: an annual growth rate of 15% (Strategies Unlimited). While this demonstrates a clear demand for lasers operating in this critical wavelength range, suppliers struggle to offer compact and practical sources that meet the demand of the real-world applications listed above. A new technological approach is therefore required to unlock many of these important application areas and the resultant market, reinvigorated by these sources, will undoubtedly expand._x000D_Whilst Quantum Cascade Lasers (QCL), emitting in the long-wave-infrared LWIR (5-12µm), have undergone significant and impressive developments in recent years, they typically offer limited flexibility - low average power, limited tunability and no ultrafast or high-energy pulses. Optical Parametric Oscillators (OPOs) are the most flexible approach to generating IR radiation with the widest spectral coverage, offering excellent stand-off detection ranges (100s of meters) with unprecedented species differentiation. While these devices have shown great potential in the visible and near-IR, their success in the LWIR has been hampered due to the lack of practical pump sources. _x000D_In the near infrared, AlGaAs diode lasers emitting around 810nm have become the primary pump source of choice for the majority of solid-state lasers (e.g. Nd:YAG) operating around 1µm. Deeper in the infrared (2µm) Ho:YAG has become an established gain medium but unfortunately there is no analogue of the low-cost, high-power AlGaAs pumps. Instead more complex and expensive solid-state lasers (e.g thulium) are used. This is critical as Ho:YAG has a host of medical and industrial processing applications as well as being an ideal pump source for a range of LWIR lasers (Cr:chalcogenide) and OPOs. We will develop a more compact, practical and significantly more cost-effective pump platform based on novel, high-power Optically-Pumped Semiconductor Disk Lasers (OP-SDL) for a number of system and application development strands in the NOVIRLAS project. Such devices utilize undoped quantum well gain structures which act as an intermediate step to convert, e.g. the abundant power of 980nm and 1.5µm diode lasers into the MIR with versatile external resonators. Using the GaSb material system will provide power-scalable, multi-Watt (10-100W), wavelength flexible (1.9-2.5µm) pumps for a range of practical holmium lasers and OPOs. These systems will be developed by the beneficiary SMEs, M Squared Lasers and LISA Laser Products _x000D_The Fraunhofer IAF will develop new OP-SDL structures emitting at around 2µm. These will then be integrated into appropriate resonator geometries which will allow their combination with dielectric laser materials and non-linear optical media. The aim here is twofold: to scale the output power of these devices while COtaining a compact form factor to enable their use as pump sources for crystalline holmium gain media at 1.9µm and for direct ZGP OPO pumping at 2.3µm._x000D_LISA will use high-power 1.9µm SDLs to develop and ruggedize a suite of extra-cavity and intra-cavity pumped cw and pulsed Holmium lasers for materials processing and medical applications. These sources will then be fed back into the technical work program as optimised pump platforms for the development of novel LWIR cw and pulsed OPOs._x000D_M Squared Lasers, who offer broadly tunable, 2-5µm, state-of-the-art MIR OPO systems will, utilizing Fraunhofer CAP as a subcontractor, develop LWIR ZGP OPO sources with broad, continuous tuning between 5-10µm in the spectral fingerprint region; a significant extension of their capability and product range. A variety of OPO configurations will be investigated, with a particular emphasis placed on the intra-cavity approach - where the nonlinear crystal is placed within the parent SDL and/or holmium laser to enable low-threshold, high-efficiency compact devices. Pulsed and cw pumping by the Ho-based systems described above will be exploited for high-peak-power (long-range) and continuous-wave (high resolution spectroscopic) applications. OP-SDLs at 2.3µm will be utilized for the direct intra-cavity pumping of OPOs: the ultimate in compact and efficient spectroscopic sources for a wide range of chemical detection applications.
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Acronym
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NovIRLas
(Reference Number: 8630)
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Duration
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01/09/2013 - 29/02/2016
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Project Topic
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NovIRLas aims to develop a novel hybrid semiconductor-dielectric pump laser to realise a source of high-power and tunability in the 2µm and molecular fingerprint waveband enabling the next generation of laser systems for stand-off chemical detection, medical surgery and material processing.
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Network
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Eurostars
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Call
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Eurostars Cut-Off 10
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Project partner
