Development of Sesquioxide Ceramic for High Energy Lasers
Abstract
In this project, the PI was able to evaluate the performance of developed materials with new standards and evaluation methods. Simultaneously, he was able to extract the unique problem of sesquioxide materials and improve their quality. The significance of the findings include, the relationship between the appropriate evaluation process for the performance of materials and laser oscillation performance. The following findings were obtained from this project. 1) Fabrication of highly transparent (theoretical transmittance) rare-earth oxide ceramics was successful. 2) In-line transmittance and optical homogeneity of host materials such as Sc2O3, Lu2O3 and Y2O3 ceramics were excellent. 3) Optical homogeneity was lowered by adding laser active ions into the above host materials. 4) Optical heterogeneity was caused by the inhomogeneous distribution of laser active ions in the host materials. 5) Due to the phenomenon described in 4), laser oscillation efficiency gets lower or in the worst case, laser oscillation is not possible. (However, when the laser gain length is extremely reduced, both laser output power and laser oscillation efficiency can be significantly improved.) 6) Even for ceramic materials derived from co-precipitated powders, improved performance was not recognized (as of this current project). 7) Production of large scaled laser gain media by ceramic process is available. What new research questions came about from this project: The outstanding issue is the formation of optically inhomogeneous parts when laser ions are doped into the host materials.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- May 25, 2015
- Accession Number
- ADA623540
Entities
People
- Akio Ikesue