PTR Glass Melting Facility for Fabrication of Diffractive Optical Elements

Abstract

The proposed research instrumentation, a Photo-Thermo-Refractive (PTR) Glass Melting Facility, is used to support MDA-funded and new research initiatives in the study of photosensitive glass for rugged volume diffractive optical elements. This instrumentation significantly impacts existing efforts in hologram recording in PTR glasses. Diffractive optical elements made from this glass are used in the BMDO/MDA-funded program "Holographic Narrow-Band Filter and Data Storage for Optical Target Characterization" and a number of PTR-related projects funded by DARPA, AFRL, and ARL. The author's significant achievements in the creation of these new diffractive optical elements were enabled by a "COMPUTER CONTROLLED RECORDING AND TESTING SYSTEM FOR STUDIES OF HOLOGRAPHIC OPTICAL ELEMENTS" that was designed and constructed under a BMDO/DURIP project that was started in the year 2000. The level of current and future efforts is limited by having to use 400 ml fused silica crucibles for melting PTR glass. The new melting system is based on the use of a platinum crucible that allows fabrication of PTR glass blanks with a diameter of up to 50 mm and a homogeneity of refractive index better than 10(exp -5). This homogeneous photosensitive glass enables the creation of diffractive optical components with the spectral and angular selectivity that are necessary for further development of PTR technology for high power laser beam control and optical target characterization. Glass produced by the requested system will be utilized in new research efforts for high-accuracy holographic optical elements used in laser and opto-electronic devices for optical target characterization, such as narrow band filters, attenuators, beam splitters, samplers, and multiplexers. (15 figures, 11 refs.)

Open PDF

Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
May 15, 2004
Accession Number
ADA424017

Entities

People

  • Leonid Glebov

Organizations

  • University of Central Florida

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Energy and Power Technologies
  • Sensors

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Crystals
  • Department Of Defense
  • Diffraction
  • Fabrication
  • Holographic Optical Elements
  • Laser Beams
  • Laser Diodes
  • Lasers
  • Materials
  • Optical Glass
  • Optical Materials
  • Optical Properties
  • Optics
  • Power Supplies
  • Refraction
  • Refractive Index
  • Scattering

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Materials Science and Engineering.
  • Optical Physics and Photonics.
  • Technical Research and Report Writing.

Technology Areas

  • Directed Energy
  • Microelectronics