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This is the third entry in a series of blog posts that explore DataRay’s pulsed laser measurement capabilities. The previous blog posts provided an overview of pulsed lasers and covered how individual pulses can be measured using Auto-Trigger mode or External Trigger mode to synchronize exposures to single pulses. This blog post will talk about the energy requirements involved with measuring pulsed lasers, and how the received signal can be controlled when the exposure time is fixed.

In our previous blog post, we provided an overview of pulsed lasers and how the exposure time of a camera must synchronize with a laser pulse to provide an accurate measurement. We talked about how Auto-Trigger Mode can be used to measure pulsed lasers with no formal synchronization by setting an appropriate exposure time and rejecting partial pulse captures. This blog post will now talk about how an external trigger can be used to formally synchronize the exposure time to the pulse width. This External Trigger mode provides more versatile and precise measurements of pulsed lasers.

DataRay has long offered products with the capability of measuring pulsed lasers in addition to continuous wave (CW) lasers. This blog post will review how capturing pulsed lasers with a camera beam profiler differs from capturing CW lasers, and how the additional challenges with pulsed lasers are handled to provide useful measurements with the software’s Auto-Trigger mode.

DataRay has always been committed to providing accurate and reliable solutions for characterizing a wide range of laser beams. We take pride in listening to customer requests and working to expand our product line to meet their needs. DataRay is happy to announce our new Line Laser Profiling System (LLPS) with the capability to provide direct measurements of line lasers up to 200 mm in length and down to 55 microns in thickness.

Although in the past DataRay CMOS beam profiling cameras were listed with a wavelength range of 355-1350 nm due to assumed sensor deterioration by short wavelength light, recent testing has demonstrated the CMOS sensor can image ultraviolet (UV) light down to 266 nm without sensor degradation; in this blog post we describe the test results.

Although the clip level method and the second moment method are the most popular methods of beam width measurement, other beam width measurement techniques such as the D86 method can be used with beam profiling cameras. Rather than using the 1D or 2D profile of the beam to determine the width, the D86 method uses the diameter of a 86.5% power enclosure as the beam width. In this blog post we describe the D86 beam width measurement method and the applications for which it is most appropriate.