Efficient beam shaping for high-power laser applications

Abstract

High-power laser sources are used in many applications for material processing, like annealing, welding, soldering, printing and micro-machining. Additionally, they are widely used as illumination sources for metrology - e.g. LIDAR - and vision systems based on CCD cameras. In many of these applications homogenous top-hat square or rectangular light fields as well as light lines are indispensable or add strong advantages to the application. LIMO has a unique production technology based on computer-aided design that enables the manufacture of high-precision microlens arrays with free programmable surfaces. Thus, specific beam profiles with superior uniformity and efficiency can be generated. Compact beam shaper modules with prealigned optics have been developed. These modules simply have to be placed into the collimated input beam and the required intensity profile is generated at the target without any complicated alignment. High-power diode laser systems for the NIR spectral region from 1W to several KW are available with application-specific beam shapes due to integrated micro-optics. Special attention is put on compact and solid design for rough environmental conditions.