BOTHELL, Wash.—Aculight Corp. in Bothell, Wash., is introducing the Telesto family of pulsed fiber lasers for applications such as laser radar (LADAR), surveillance, mapping, and nonlinear optics conversion.
The Telesto fiber lasers are rugged, polarized, offer high-peak-power, and have output at 1 micron.
“Aculight developed Telesto lasers to bring fiber laser technology to demanding active imaging applications that rely on the one-micron wavelength,” says Robert Afzal, Aculight’s vice president of research and development.
“Historically, these systems have used diode-pumped solid-state lasers. Telesto lasers are more compact, robust, and efficient, and they generate very short, stable pulses over a wide repetition rate range. For a LADAR user this means detailed, accurate, long-range images from an environmentally hardened package.”
Fiber lasers have long been desired for applications such as LADAR because their all-fiber design provides users with a more efficient, rugged, and compact source than traditional laser technologies. Telesto lasers also provide high-peak-power output over a wide repetition rate range from a hermetically sealed, low-jitter source.
In addition, Telesto lasers’ polarized output allows users to employ polarization in addition to wavelength as a way of discriminating objects in an image.
Aculight’s standard Telesto laser, Model P36L-1064, produces 3-to-5-nanosecond pulses at repetition rates from 20 kHz to 750 kHz with 4 watts of average power (>50 kHz). Maximum pulse energy is 80 microjoules; peak power is 25 kilowatts.
The unit’s 1-micron output is less than 1.5 times the diffraction limit. It measures 2.6 by 6 by 7 inches, and weighs less than 8 pounds. Custom configurations are also available. For more information, visit Aculight online at www.aculight.com.
