New Laser System Up and Running
January 2020
Researchers at the University of Southampton, Optoelectronics Research Centre have carried out the first experiments with their new laser system purchased for the LEAF-2D project. Prior to this, experiments had been conducted using an old Ti:Sapphire Chirped Pulse Amplifier system that had reached the end of its life and could only produce laser pulses at a wavelength of 800 nm. The new system (manufactured by Lithuania based laser company Light Conversion) consists of two main parts: The box on the left of the photo is a Pharos SP-1mJ this squeezes most of the functionality of the old laser system into about 1/10th of the space on the optical table. The grey box on the right is of the photo is an Orhpeus One HE Optical Parametric Amplifier (OPA) this is the new part, purchased especially for the LEAF-2D project. This clever box makes it possible to tune the wavelength of laser pulses to anywhere in the range 1450 nm to 2000 nm. This is critically important for the LEAF-2D project because researchers need to use infrared wavelengths where materials such as silicon become transparent.
