Jan 24 2008
Intense Ltd., developer of next generation lasers, has announced an expansion of the Hermes family of high power QCW (quasi-continuous wave) arrays at Photonics West 2008. The newest lasers, now qualified to military standards, combine high reliability with robust, modular packaging in a standard wavelength of 808 nm with power levels up to 900 W.
The Hermes stacks degrade by less than 5% over 2 x 108 shots as compared to competitive products that degrade by 20% or more. This means the Hermes products provide significantly longer lifetimes, ultimately reducing costs for OEM developers. The Hermes stacked arrays are "QWI enabled," developed using Intense's patented Quantum Well Intermixing (QWI) technology, which produces superior power, unrivalled brightness, and high reliability for a wide range of demanding applications, such as rangefinding, target designation, and pumping.
"Intense's Quantum Well Intermixing process is revolutionizing the way lasers are solving mission critical applications by producing integrated chips at performance levels and yields previously unseen in the industry," stated Professor John Marsh, Ph.D., CTO at Intense and developer of the company's patented QWI technology. "Hermes high power lasers are based on a compact, modular architecture that delivers high brightness and high efficiency. This improves overall performance of the OEM system, reduces energy consumption, and allows for development of innovative optical products."
Up to 900 Watts, Military Qualified
The Hermes QCW stacked arrays are available as vertically or horizontally stacked assemblies of up to 10 bars, with lensed and unlensed options. Standard configurations include:
- Hermes 360W: 4-bar stacked array, minimum 360 W peak output power
- Hermes 540W: 6-bar stacked array, minimum 540 W peak output power
- Hermes 720W: 8-bar stacked array, minimum 720 W peak output power
- Hermes 900W: 10-bar stacked array, minimum 900 W peak output power
- Other wavelengths are available on request.
Developed using a highly robust hard solder process for stack assembly, Hermes 900W, the 10-bar stacked array, has been qualified to military standard MIL-STD-810F, Methods 501.4, 503.4, 514.5, and 516.5.
Quantum Well Intermixing: QWI Enabled
Hermes QWI enabled lasers are based on Intense's patented Quantum Well Intermixing (QWI) process. This process increases the quantum well band-gap of a semiconductor laser in a controlled and very precise manner, such that active and passive sections can be created in the same laser cavity. Passive non-absorbing mirrors (NAMs) are created at the facet regions of the cavities to avoid catastrophic optical mirror damage (COMD), a problem frequently encountered in typical laser devices. The end result is a high performance laser that can operate at high optical power and brightness with exceptional reliability.
Availability
The Hermes stacked laser arrays are available now. Pricing is based on quantities ordered. Other wavelengths are available on request.