Material jet printing of transparent ceramic Yb:YAG planar waveguides

A new, to the best of our knowledge, 3D additive manufacturing technique utilizing particle-loaded ink jet printing to fabricate transparent ceramic Yb:YAG planar waveguides for laser gain media was demonstrated. Rheological optimization of YAG particle-loaded inks resulted in successful droplet for...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Optics letters 2021-05, Vol.46 (10)
Main Authors: Seeley, Zachary M., Phillips, Ian R., Rudzik, Thomas J., Cherepy, Nerine J., Drobshoff, Alexander D., Payne, Stephen A.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Lasers
MATERIALS SCIENCE
Optics and optical instruments
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:A new, to the best of our knowledge, 3D additive manufacturing technique utilizing particle-loaded ink jet printing to fabricate transparent ceramic Yb:YAG planar waveguides for laser gain media was demonstrated. Rheological optimization of YAG particle-loaded inks resulted in successful droplet formation and printing resolution. Planar waveguides composed of a Yb:YAG guide encased in undoped YAG cladding were printed with guide thicknesses ranging between 25 and 350 µm and consolidated to high optical quality via solid-state sintering. Sufficiently low optical (1–3%/cm) and intermodal scatter allowed single-mode propagation with a core/clad index difference of Δ n ∼ 5.0 × 10 − 4 (corresponding to 3 at.% Yb). The waveguides were cladding-pumped longitudinally with a 940 nm diode array resulting in 23.6% slope efficiency in 2 ms pulsed operation.
ISSN:0146-9592
1539-4794