Broad-area edge-emitting semiconductor laser with limited thermal contact
Granted: May 21, 2013
Patent Number:
8446926
A diode-laser having an elongated diode-laser emitter is mounted on a relatively massive heat-sink. Two parallel grooves are machined into the heat-sink to leave a relatively narrow elongated ridge of the heat-sink between the grooves. The ridge has a width about equal to or narrower that the width of the emitter. The diode-laser is mounted on the heat-sink such that thermal communication between the emitter and heat-sink is essentially limited to thermal communication with the ridge.
Partial hardening of a software program from a software implementation to a hardware implementation
Granted: May 7, 2013
Patent Number:
8438510
System and method for developing an ASIC. A software program may be stored which includes program instructions which implement a function. The software program may be executed on a processing system at a desired system speed and may be validated based on the execution. A first hardware description of at least a portion of the processing system may be stored and may specify implementation of at least a portion of the processing system. A second hardware description may be generated that…
High-precision synchronization of pulsed gas-discharge lasers
Granted: April 2, 2013
Patent Number:
8411721
Two excimer lasers have individual pulsing circuits each including a storage capacitor which is charged and then discharged through a pulse transformer to generate an electrical pulse, which is delivered to the laser to generate a light pulse. The time between generation of the electrical pulse and creation of the light pulse is dependent on the charged voltage of the capacitor. The capacitors are charged while disconnected from each other. The generation of the electrical pulses is…
Carrier-envelope-phase stabilization of a master oscillator optical amplifier system
Granted: April 2, 2013
Patent Number:
8411354
A laser and amplifier combination delivers a sequence of optical pulses at a predetermined pulse-repetition frequency PRF. An interferometer generates a signal representative of the carrier-envelope phase (CEP) of the pulses at intervals corresponding to the PRF. The signal includes frequency components from DC to the PRF. The signal is divided into high and low frequency ranges. The high and low frequency ranges are sent to independent high frequency and low frequency control…
Pulsed fiber-MOPA with widely-variable pulse-duration
Granted: April 2, 2013
Patent Number:
8411352
Master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) apparatus includes two seed-pulse sources coupled to a single fiber amplifier including one or more stages of amplification. One of the seed-pulse sources is a single-mode source generating pulses having a duration selectively variable between about 0.1 ns and 10 ns. The other seed-pulse source is a multi-mode source generating pulses having a duration selectively variable between about 1 ns and 10 ?s. Selectively operating one or the other of the…
Gas laser discharge pre-ionization using a simmer-discharge
Granted: March 5, 2013
Patent Number:
8391329
A gas discharge laser including a lasing gas between discharge electrodes and has a power supply for generating RF pulses to be delivered to the electrodes of the laser for energizing the lasing gas. A sequence of RF simmer pulses is delivered to the electrodes. The simmer pulses create sufficient free electrons in the lasing gas to facilitate subsequent ignition of the discharge while not causing laser action. RF lasing pulses having a longer duration than the simmer pulses are…
Optical pumping of a solid-state gain-medium using a diode-laser bar stack with individually addressable bars
Granted: March 5, 2013
Patent Number:
8391328
A diode-laser bar stack includes a plurality of diode-laser bars having different temperature dependent peak-emission wavelengths. The stack is arranged such that the bars can be separately powered. This allows one or more of the bars to be “on” while others are “off”. A switching arrangement is described for selectively turning bars on or off, responsive to a signal representative of the temperature of the diode-laser bar stack, for providing a desired total emission spectrum.
Frequency-tripled fiber MOPA
Granted: February 12, 2013
Patent Number:
8373924
Fundamental-wavelength pulses from a fiber a laser are divided into three or more pulse portions and the three or more portions are separately amplified. Two or more of the amplified fundamental-wavelength pulse-portions are combined and frequency-doubled. The frequency doubled portion is sum-frequency mixed with one or more of the other amplified fundamental wavelength pulse-portions to provide third-harmonic radiation pulses.
Pre-ionization method for COgas-discharge laser
Granted: February 5, 2013
Patent Number:
8369373
An RF powered CO2 gas-discharge laser includes discharge electrodes and a lasing gas mixture between the electrode. The lasing gas mixture is ionized when the RF power is applied to the electrodes and laser action is initiated when the RF power has been applied for a duration sufficient to ignite a discharge in the lasing gas mixture. The gas mixture is pre-ionized by periodically applying the RF power to the electrodes for a predetermined period during which ignition of a discharge is…
Method and apparatus related to a side-fire member having a doped silica component
Granted: January 22, 2013
Patent Number:
8358890
In one embodiment, an apparatus may include an optical fiber that may have a surface non-normal to a longitudinal axis of a distal end portion of the optical fiber. The surface may define a portion of an interface configured to redirect electromagnetic radiation propagated from within the optical fiber and incident on the interface to a direction offset from the longitudinal axis. The apparatus may also include a doped silica cap that may be fused to the optical fiber such that the…
Transmission of multimedia streams to mobile devices with uncoded transport tunneling
Granted: January 22, 2013
Patent Number:
8358705
A system and method for wirelessly transmitting audiovisual information. First audiovisual information may be encoded using a first error correction coding method. A plurality of packets may be generated, including the first audiovisual information, second audiovisual information, and control information. The second audiovisual information may not be encoded using the first error correction coding method, and the control information may indicate this. The plurality of packets may be…
Laser engraving apparatus
Granted: January 15, 2013
Patent Number:
8354611
In laser engraving apparatus for engraving a gray-scale image on a plastic ID-card, the laser is a modulatable optically pumped semiconductor laser. Focusing optics focus a beam from the laser into a focal spot about 10 micrometers in diameter. The ID-card is mounted on a turntable which is rotated such that the focal spot sweeps over the ID card. The turntable is translated in a direction transverse to the rotation direction and the laser is modulated such that the engraved gray-scale…
Impedance-matching transformers for RF driven COgas discharge lasers
Granted: January 15, 2013
Patent Number:
8354893
In a CO2 gas discharge laser energized by a radio frequency (RF) power source a transformer having selectively variable output impedance is used to match output impedance of the power source to the impedance of discharge electrodes of the laser. A similar transformer can be used to impose a selective variable phase-shift on the RF power from the source. The variable impedance transformer can also be used for impedance matching between amplifier stages in the power source.
Modulation method for diode-laser pumped lasers
Granted: January 8, 2013
Patent Number:
8351477
A method of operating a digitally modulated solid state laser is disclosed. The laser is optically pumped by a current-supply driven diode-laser radiation and with output-power stabilized at a desired value by a light regulator cooperative with a power monitor and the current source is disclosed. When the laser is turned on, the current-source is enabled and the light-regulator is disabled. A current regulator allows current from the current-supply to increase until the monitored power…
Digital pulse-width-modulation control of a radio frequency power supply for pulsed laser
Granted: January 8, 2013
Patent Number:
8351480
A pulse width modulation method for controlling the output power of a pulsed gas discharge laser powered by a pulsed RF power supply comprises delivering a train of digital pulses to the RF power supply. Each pulse in the train has an incrementally variable duration. The power supply is arranged to deliver a train of RF pulses corresponding in number and duration to the train of digital pulses received. The average power in the RF-pulse train can be varied by incrementally varying the…
Transmission of multimedia streams to mobile devices with variable training information
Granted: January 1, 2013
Patent Number:
8347339
A system and method for wirelessly transmitting audiovisual information. Training information may be stored in a memory. A plurality of packets may be generated, including the training information. The plurality of packets may also include audiovisual information. The plurality of packets may include first information identifying a first training pattern of a plurality of possible training patterns. The first training pattern may specify one or more locations of the training information…
Transmission of multimedia streams to mobile devices with cross stream association
Granted: December 11, 2012
Patent Number:
8332896
A system and method for wirelessly transmitting audiovisual information. A first plurality of packets including audiovisual information may be generated. A second plurality of packets including error correction coding information for the audiovisual information may be generated. Control information for associating the error correction coding information with the audiovisual information may be generated, and a third plurality of packets including the control information may also be…
Cavity-dumped pulsed solid-state laser with variable pulse-duration
Granted: December 4, 2012
Patent Number:
8325771
In a cavity-dumped, repetitively-pulsed, solid-state laser cavity dumping is protracted over a predetermined time longer than a round-trip time of the resonator of the laser. The cavity dumping is effected by a Pockels cell optical switch. During a dumping period a voltage applied to the Pockels cell falls in a predetermined time. Varying the voltage fall-time varies the duration of pulses provided by the laser, independent of the pulse-repetition frequency.
Combined active and passive imaging system with radiation source unit and detector
Granted: November 13, 2012
Patent Number:
8309900
A combined active and passive imaging system comprises a radiation sources configured to output radiation beams towards a detector and an object in a scene. The system further comprises the detector configured to record superposition of instances of intensity patterns of interferences between at least a portion of the radiation beams and at least a portion of return radiations from the object. The detector may further be configured to record ambient light reflected from the scene. The…
Hermetically-sealed RF feed-through with integrated capacitor
Granted: October 16, 2012
Patent Number:
8290017
A carbon-dioxide (CO2) gas-discharge slab laser includes elongated discharge-electrodes in a sealed enclosure. Radio Frequency (RF) power is supplied to the electrodes via an impedance matching network and a co-axial electrical low inductance transmission line feed-through sealed to the enclosure. The feed-trough includes two spring contacts which are configured to be spring compression push-fit in grooves in edges of the discharge-electrodes. A central conductor of the feed-through is…
