SBIR-STTR Award

A great need exists for a high brightness laser which is consistent, easy-to-use, and reliable for use in industrial, scientific, and military applications. A new enhanced photolytic iodine laser is proposed which is unique in it's simultaneously available attributes. Phase I will assess scalability of a new photolytic iodine laser to higher output power than previously achieved and address manufacturing issues. Suitability of current, near term, and future technology will be evaluated to determine refinements to designs, systems, and components needed to reach both commercial and military objectives. A design concept will address objectives including lower cost to fabricate, minimized service requirements, high reliability, and ease of use, which are critical to commercial market and military acceptance and actual usage of the technology. This new laser, once developed, will have a tightly focused high power beam for industrial applications enabling it to weld and cut faster and deeper, with more precision and drill finer, more precise holes than other comparable lasers. It will have excellent coherence and power, making it useful for scientific and military targeting and imaging applications. The impacts of special requirements of military imaging , scientific and tactical mission applications will also be evaluated.

A great improvement to obtain higher output power from photolytic iodine lasers (PILs) are high efficiency, high power UV plasma lamps. Development of new UV lamps would increase the laser's power 2-3 times, markedly increasing its potential to reach many commercial and military objectives. A matrix of new advanced lamps will be designed, fabricated, and tested for UV performance establishing good candidates. These candidates will be further developed, tested on a stand-alone testbed, and then on a PIL. Lamps will be improved from current 0.07 to 0.15-0.20 efficiencies. PILs with these lamps will a) output 500 W or more and b) have reduced cost/size of 150 W models by 1/3 without degrading reasonable costs-to-fabricate, minimized service requirements, high reliability, consistency, and ease-of-use which are critical to commercial market and military acceptance of the technology. A 500 W PIL will provide very high power, high brightness beams for industrial, scientific, and military applications. It will weld and cut faster, deeper, and with more precision than other very high power lasers and with its excellent coherence and power will be useful for scientific and military targeting and imaging applications.