Deformable mirror technologies at AOA Xinetics

Abstract

AOA Xinetics (AOX) has been at the forefront of Deformable Mirror (DM) technology development for over two decades. In this paper the current state of that technology is reviewed and the particular strengths and weaknesses of the various DM architectures are presented. Emphasis is placed on the requirements for DMs applied to the correction of high-energy and high average power lasers. Mirror designs optimized for the correction of typical thermal lensing effects in diode pumped solid-state lasers will be detailed and their capabilities summarized. Passive thermal management techniques that allow long laser run times to be supported will also be discussed.