Modeling the effects of high-energy-laser beam quality using scalar Schell-model sources

Milo W. Hyde IV; Mark F. Spencer

doi:10.1117/12.2518648

13 May 2019 Modeling the effects of high-energy-laser beam quality using scalar Schell-model sources

Milo W. Hyde IV, Mark F. Spencer

Proceedings Volume 10981, Laser Technology for Defense and Security XV; 109810O (2019) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2518648
Event: SPIE Defense + Commercial Sensing, 2019, Baltimore, MD, United States

Abstract

At the system level, poor beam quality often leads to significant performance degradations. For instance, if a high-energy laser (HEL) source has poor beam quality, then the effectiveness of a beam-control system becomes compromised. This outcome is the result of non-common path phase errors in the HEL beam that are not sensed by the beam-control system. Therefore, phase-compensation performance becomes degraded, because if the phase errors that degrade performance cannot be sensed, then their effects cannot be corrected. To help quantity these system-level performance degradations, we need a reliable and accurate way to model the effects of poor beam quality. As such, this paper develops a statistical approach using scalar Schell-model sources. Applying the work of Santarsiero et al. [J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 16, 106 (1999)], we show that we can quantify the effects of poor beam quality statistically in terms of the M² parameter. Then, we develop Monte Carlo wave-optics simulations which specify the field correlation coefficient in terms of M² for modeling HEL phase errors. The results show that we obtain convergence to the desired M² parameter thus properly modeling the phase errors. In addition, we investigate the statistics of the "instantaneous" M² parameter. We find, quite interestingly, that the instantaneous M₂ is very nearly lognormal. This information will be useful in HEL beam-control system design.

Citation Download Citation

Milo W. Hyde IV and Mark F. Spencer "Modeling the effects of high-energy-laser beam quality using scalar Schell-model sources", Proc. SPIE 10981, Laser Technology for Defense and Security XV, 109810O (13 May 2019); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2518648

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