News

22 June 2009

 

Princeton Optronics wins Navy contract for high-power blue VCSEL arrays

Early this month, Princeton Optronics Inc of Mercerville, NJ, USA, which develops high-power vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs) and low-noise solid-state lasers, said that it has received a $750,000 two-year US Navy Phase II SBIR (small business innovation research) contract to develop blue-laser arrays consisting of frequency-doubled high-power pulsed VCSELs.

The objective of the program 'High Power, High Repetition Rate, Pulsed, Blue Laser for ASW Purposes' is to develop compact, high-efficiency, short-pulsed (1-20ns) blue lasers (with energies of more than 10mJ per pulse) for Navy light detection and ranging (LIDAR) applications in airborne anti-submarine warfare, since existing lasers are bulky and low efficiency. The phase II contract follows completion of a phase I SBIR contract received last year that led to the firm demonstrating a frequency-doubled high-energy pulsed blue laser array and studying its characteristics and means to deliver high power from the array.

Princeton Optronics has taken its near-infrared-emitting VCSEL technology and frequency-doubled the radiation using a nonlinear material (periodically poled lithium niobate) in the device's structure. The laser's output is single-mode, blue (480nm), monochromatic, and has a half-angle divergence of only 8 mrad.

The lasers are constructed in two-dimensional arrays that can currently emit up to 230W of optical power from a 4.7mm-diameter area. Single lasers emit up to 30mW each with an 8% wall-plug efficiency.

In phase II, Princeton Optronics aims to improve the power level and other characteristics and to make a large array to demonstrate a high-energy pulsed array that meets the Navy’s specifications.  

High-power pulsed VCSELs also have applications in marking, materials processing, range finding and oceanography (with a market that could amount to many millions of dollars, says the firm). Princeton Optronics says that it the manufacturing and marketing capabilities to commercialize the product, and aims to do so very soon after the completion of phase II of the SBIR.

Search: VCSELs Blue lasers LIDAR

Visit: www.princetonoptronics.com

Visit: www.navysbirprogram.com