High power erbium fibre laser for laser cleaning applications

用于激光清洁应用的高功率铒光纤激光器

• 批准号: 2749625
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Southampton
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2022 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2749625
• 关键词: power; erbium; fibre; laser; cleaning

Laser cleaning is an efficient and environmentally-friendly non-contact method for removing paint and unwanted surface contamination from manmade structures to improve longevity, performance and appearance without the need for chemicals, water or abrasive mechanical tools. Owing to their power scaling advantages, pulsed fibre lasers and solid-state lasers based on ytterbium or neodymium have become the lasers of choice for laser cleaning and there are now a number of commercial products serving this market. However, these lasers suffer from the shortcoming that the maximum permissible exposure (MPE) limit before the onset of eye damage is relatively low and, as a consequence, laser cleaning operations are restricted to enclosed environments. This project will investigate a new strategy for scaling fibre lasers to meet the needs for laser cleaning, but in a wavelength band (~1.55 -1.6 um) where the MPE limit is well over an order-of-magnitude higher than for ~1 um lasers. This will allow deployment in outdoor scenarios, without the need for an enclosure, allowing laser cleaning to be used in a much wider range of situations. If successful, this will revolutionise laser cleaning and open up the prospect of even more applications made possible due to the greatly relaxed safety considerations. In terms of laser performance, the goal will be to develop a laser power scaling technology that can deliver pulsed output with energy in the range ~10-100 mJ, duration <50 ns and average powers in the few hundred-watt to kilowatt regime, as required for the intended applications.

激光清洁是一种高效、环保的非接触式方法，可去除人造结构上的油漆和不需要的表面污染物，从而提高使用寿命、性能和外观，无需使用化学品、水或磨料机械工具。由于其功率缩放优势，基于镱或钕的脉冲光纤激光器和固态激光器已成为激光清洁的首选激光器，并且现在有许多商业产品服务于该市场。然而，这些激光器的缺点是眼睛损伤发生前的最大允许暴露（MPE）限制相对较低，因此，激光清洁操作仅限于封闭环境。该项目将研究一种缩放光纤激光器的新策略，以满足激光清洁的需求，但在波长带（~1.55 -1.6 um）中，MPE 限制远高于~1 um 的数量级激光。这将允许在室外场景中部署，而无需外壳，从而允许激光清洁在更广泛的情况下使用。如果成功，这将彻底改变激光清洁，并由于大大放松的安全考虑而开辟更多应用的前景。在激光性能方面，目标是开发一种激光功率缩放技术，能够提供能量在~10-100 mJ范围内、持续时间<50 ns、平均功率在几百瓦到千瓦范围内的脉冲输出，根据预期应用的需要。