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We have achieved the NIF design goals for power and energy by delivering 1.86 MJ of ultra-violet energy in a wide dynamic range (>300:1), 22.5-ns shaped ignition pulse with a peak power of 520 TW.

General physical relations connect the expected size and depth of laser damage induced craters to absorbed laser energy and to the strength of the material. In general, for small absorbers and instantaneous energy release, one expects three regions of interest. First is an inner region in which material is subjected to high pressure and temperature, pulverized and ejected. The resultant crater morphology will appear melted. A second region, outside the first, exhibits material removal due to spallation, which occurs when a shock wave is reflected at the free surface. The crater surface in this region will appear fractured. Finally, there is an outermost region where stresses are strong enough to crack material, but not to eject it. These regions are described theoretically and compared to representative observed craters in fused silica.

A laser system to generate sodium-layer guide stars has been designed, built and delivered to the Keck Observatory in Hawaii. The system uses frequency doubled YAG lasers to pump liquid dye lasers and produces 20 W of average power. The design and performance results of this laser system are presented.

Optical component specifications for the high-average-power lasers and transport system used in the Atomic Vapor Laser Isotope Separation (AVLIS) plant must address demanding system performance requirements. The need for high performance optics has to be balanced against the practical desire to reduce the supply risks of cost and schedule. This is addressed in optical system design, careful planning with the optical industry, demonstration of plant quality parts, qualification of optical suppliers and processes, comprehensive procedures for evaluation and test, and a plan for corrective action.

The installation and performance characteristics of a 20 W sodium beacon laser system for the 3 m Shane telescope at the Lick Observatory are presented.

The design and background data for a sodium layer laser guide star system to be installed on the 3 meter telescope at Lick Observatory is presented. A 30 W dye laser at 589 nm and 10 kHz will be mounted on the telescope and will be pumped by fiber coupled, frequency doubled YAG laser located in a separate room.© (1994) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.

We present the design and implementation of a very compact adaptive optics system that senses the return light from a sodium guide-star and controls a deformable mirror and a pointing mirror to compensate atmospheric perturbations in the wavefront. The deformable mirror has 19 electrostrictive actuators and triangular subapertures. The wavefront sensor is a Hartmann sensor with lenslets on triangular centers. The high-bandwidth steering mirror assembly incorporates an analog controller that samples the tilt with an avalanche photodiode quad cell. An f/25 imaging leg focuses the light into a science camera that can either obtain long-exposure images or speckle data. In laboratory tests overall Strehl ratios were improved by a factor of 3 when a mylar sheet was used as an aberrator. The crossover frequency at unity gain is 30 Hz.

The large lattice parameter (ao equals 23.44 angstroms) of cubic YB66 together with its vacuum compatibility, mechanical properties and resistance to radiation damage makes this material well suited for use as soft x-ray monochromator in the 1 - 2 keV region. Crystals obtained by various growth modes of an indirect heating floating zone (IHFZ) technique are characterized with x-ray topography and rocking curve measurements using both laboratory and synchrotron sources. The results indicate that high quality single crystals of YB66 large enough to accept at least 1 mrad of synchrotron beam can be produced.© (1993) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.

The use is studied of a unity-magnification micro-optic beam deflector. The defelector consists of two arrays of positively powered lenslets. The lenslets on each array are arranged in a square grid. Design criteria are based on usefulness in optical data storage devices. The deflector is designed to operate over a + or - 1.6 range of deflection angles. Modeling results are compared with interferometric analysis of the wavefront from a single lenslet pair. The results indicate that the device is nearly diffraction limited, but there are substantial wavefront errors at the edges and corners of the lenslets.