Alternative Methods for Creating a Sodium Guidestar

The purpose of this proposed research is to develop and commercialize a novel two color sodium guidestar laser operating simultaneously at 589 nm and 1141 nm. Our patented T-cavity design combined with VECSEL technology will be the basis for the guidestar development. The polychromatic laser guidestar (PLGS) system being proposed currently does not exist and would allow for the correction of atmospheric induced Tip and Tilt aberrations without the use of a natural guidestar. This would be a substantial increase in corrective ability for AO systems which would be especially important for clearly imaging dim objects. In addition, there is a great deal of interest in areas such as: optical metrology, high-resolution spectroscopy (e.g. LIDAR), and optical fiber communications which specifically need lasers covering 570-590 nm range. Through this STTR proposal,TPhotonics Inc. and The University of Arizona propose to use a patented novel modified t-cavity design, which incorporates vertical external cavity surface emitting laser (VECSEL) technology, to realize high-power two color laser for sodium guidestar lasers.