Stable Emissions from a Four-Rod Nd:YAG Solar Laser with ±0.5° Tracking Error Compensation Capacity
Conventional solar-pumped lasers rely on expensive and highly accurate solar tracking systems, which present a significant economic barrier to both solar laser research and practical applications. To address this challenge, an end-side-pumped four-rod solar laser head was designed and built for test...
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MDPI AG
2023-09-01
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| Series: | Photonics |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2304-6732/10/9/1047 |
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| author | Miguel Catela Dawei Liang Joana Almeida Hugo Costa Dário Garcia Bruno D. Tibúrcio Emmanuel Guillot Cláudia R. Vistas |
| author_facet | Miguel Catela Dawei Liang Joana Almeida Hugo Costa Dário Garcia Bruno D. Tibúrcio Emmanuel Guillot Cláudia R. Vistas |
| author_sort | Miguel Catela |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Conventional solar-pumped lasers rely on expensive and highly accurate solar tracking systems, which present a significant economic barrier to both solar laser research and practical applications. To address this challenge, an end-side-pumped four-rod solar laser head was designed and built for testing at PROMES-CNRS. Solar radiation was collected and concentrated using a heliostat–parabolic mirror system. A fused silica aspheric lens further concentrated the solar rays into a flux homogenizer within which four Nd:YAG rods were symmetrically positioned around a reflective cone and cooled by water. Four partially reflective mirrors were precisely aligned to extract continuous-wave 1064 nm solar laser power from each laser rod. The prototype demonstrated stable multibeam solar laser operation with the solar tracking system turned on. Even when the tracking system was turned off, the total output power extracted from the solar-pumped laser remained stable for 1 min, representing, to the best of our knowledge, the first successful demonstration of a stable multibeam solar laser operation without solar tracking. For typical solar tracking errors up to ±0.5°, the loss in the total solar laser power produced was only about 1%, representing an 8.0-fold improvement over the previous solar laser experiments under tracking error conditions. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-10T22:13:57Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-022125ccd9f94f91a12b26235b4e1a0d |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2304-6732 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-10T22:13:57Z |
| publishDate | 2023-09-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Photonics |
| spelling | doaj.art-022125ccd9f94f91a12b26235b4e1a0d2023-11-19T12:30:20ZengMDPI AGPhotonics2304-67322023-09-01109104710.3390/photonics10091047Stable Emissions from a Four-Rod Nd:YAG Solar Laser with ±0.5° Tracking Error Compensation CapacityMiguel Catela0Dawei Liang1Joana Almeida2Hugo Costa3Dário Garcia4Bruno D. Tibúrcio5Emmanuel Guillot6Cláudia R. Vistas7Centre of Physics and Technological Research (CEFITEC), School of Science and Technology, Campus da Caparica, New University of Lisbon, 2829-516 Caparica, PortugalCentre of Physics and Technological Research (CEFITEC), School of Science and Technology, Campus da Caparica, New University of Lisbon, 2829-516 Caparica, PortugalCentre of Physics and Technological Research (CEFITEC), School of Science and Technology, Campus da Caparica, New University of Lisbon, 2829-516 Caparica, PortugalCentre of Physics and Technological Research (CEFITEC), School of Science and Technology, Campus da Caparica, New University of Lisbon, 2829-516 Caparica, PortugalCentre of Physics and Technological Research (CEFITEC), School of Science and Technology, Campus da Caparica, New University of Lisbon, 2829-516 Caparica, PortugalCentre of Physics and Technological Research (CEFITEC), School of Science and Technology, Campus da Caparica, New University of Lisbon, 2829-516 Caparica, PortugalPROMES-CNRS, 7 Rue du Four Solaire, 66120 Font-Romeu-Odeillo-Via, FranceCentre of Physics and Technological Research (CEFITEC), School of Science and Technology, Campus da Caparica, New University of Lisbon, 2829-516 Caparica, PortugalConventional solar-pumped lasers rely on expensive and highly accurate solar tracking systems, which present a significant economic barrier to both solar laser research and practical applications. To address this challenge, an end-side-pumped four-rod solar laser head was designed and built for testing at PROMES-CNRS. Solar radiation was collected and concentrated using a heliostat–parabolic mirror system. A fused silica aspheric lens further concentrated the solar rays into a flux homogenizer within which four Nd:YAG rods were symmetrically positioned around a reflective cone and cooled by water. Four partially reflective mirrors were precisely aligned to extract continuous-wave 1064 nm solar laser power from each laser rod. The prototype demonstrated stable multibeam solar laser operation with the solar tracking system turned on. Even when the tracking system was turned off, the total output power extracted from the solar-pumped laser remained stable for 1 min, representing, to the best of our knowledge, the first successful demonstration of a stable multibeam solar laser operation without solar tracking. For typical solar tracking errors up to ±0.5°, the loss in the total solar laser power produced was only about 1%, representing an 8.0-fold improvement over the previous solar laser experiments under tracking error conditions.https://www.mdpi.com/2304-6732/10/9/1047parabolic mirrorsolar laserNd:YAGmultibeamsolar tracking error |
| spellingShingle | Miguel Catela Dawei Liang Joana Almeida Hugo Costa Dário Garcia Bruno D. Tibúrcio Emmanuel Guillot Cláudia R. Vistas Stable Emissions from a Four-Rod Nd:YAG Solar Laser with ±0.5° Tracking Error Compensation Capacity Photonics parabolic mirror solar laser Nd:YAG multibeam solar tracking error |
| title | Stable Emissions from a Four-Rod Nd:YAG Solar Laser with ±0.5° Tracking Error Compensation Capacity |
| title_full | Stable Emissions from a Four-Rod Nd:YAG Solar Laser with ±0.5° Tracking Error Compensation Capacity |
| title_fullStr | Stable Emissions from a Four-Rod Nd:YAG Solar Laser with ±0.5° Tracking Error Compensation Capacity |
| title_full_unstemmed | Stable Emissions from a Four-Rod Nd:YAG Solar Laser with ±0.5° Tracking Error Compensation Capacity |
| title_short | Stable Emissions from a Four-Rod Nd:YAG Solar Laser with ±0.5° Tracking Error Compensation Capacity |
| title_sort | stable emissions from a four rod nd yag solar laser with 0 5° tracking error compensation capacity |
| topic | parabolic mirror solar laser Nd:YAG multibeam solar tracking error |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2304-6732/10/9/1047 |
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