Development of ceramic fibers for high-energy laser applications

Abstract

Polycrystalline ceramics offer a number of advantages relative to single crystal materials such as lower processing temperatures, improved mechanical properties, and higher doping levels with more uniform distribution of dopants for improved laser performance. Ceramic YAG (Y₃Al₅O₁₂) and rare earth sesquioxide (RE₂O₃) fibers promise to enable a number of high power laser devices via high thermal conductivity and higher allowable dopant concentration; however, these materials are not currently available as fine diameter optical-quality fibers. Powder processing approaches for laser quality polycrystalline ceramic fibers are in development at AFRL. Current processing techniques will be reviewed. The effects of a number of processing variables on the resulting fibers as well as preliminary optical characterization will also be presented.