Due to the thermal-induced stress during the bonding process, the emitters in a laser diode array (LDA) are vertically displaced, which causes the near-field bowing of a laser diode bar (i.e., the SMILE effect). Near-field bowing degrades the laser beam brightness, adversely affecting optical coupling and beam shaping, resulting in a larger divergence angle and a wider line after focusing and collimation. The mechanism of near-field bowing has been theoretically studied, in which the ratio of tensile strength between submount and heat sink has a great effect on the deformation of LDAs. Arm-wrestling between CuW submount and heat sink vividly describes that the deformation of LDAs changes as a function of the ratio of two materials’ tensile strength. We design a symmetrical structure that bonds another submount on the bottom of the heat sink to control the SMILE effect by balancing the acting force from the top of the heat sink. The deformation of the heat sink and LDAs are approximately zero when the thermal-induced stresses forced on the top and bottom of the heat sink are equal.
We have simulated and optimized a conductive cooling structure including the distribution of temperature in active layer, and the deformation of laser to achieve high power operation with low SMILE value. Unlike the traditional conductive cooling structure, our structure improves the heat dissipation efficiency from three aspects: with angle structure in the front of heat sink; double side heat dissipation and without submount packaging technology. In this report, an output power of more than 250W CW from a 4 mm long laser bar with a filling factor of 50% is shown at 240A driving current with a power conversion efficiency of 65%. The thermal rollover of this packaging conductive cooling device can reach 385W at 400A driving current.
Large smile, the emitters in a laser diode are vertically displaced, is always a big obstacle to affect the directly application of high power laser diode. In this report, a symmetrical structure, that bonding two submounts on the top and bottom of heat sink to control the smile effect by balancing the packaging induced stress, is designed. A cm bar with less than 1 um smile value delivering more than 200W continuous wave (CW) mode output power with power conversion efficiency (PCE) 65% is reported. The lifetime can reach more than 20000 hours. We also report the applications of high power and low smile vertically stacked laser bars, like forming a wider line for glass surface treatment and a rectangular beam for cladding. A 2x14mm2 rectangular beam was built with 32 bars vertical stack to produce 6kW CW mode output power with a beam uniformity of more than 80%.
High power laser diodes have been widely utilized in many fields, like industry, scientific research, military and medical treatment, etc. However, thermal stress induced by packaging process due to CTE-mismatch between chip and heat-sink is the main source causing near-field non-linearity along laser bar (also known as “SMILE”), decreasing the degree of polarization (DoP), broadening spectrum, and degrading the lifetime of laser diode array (LDA). In this paper, the effect of packaging induced thermal stress on high power laser diode arrays was studied theoretically and experimentally. The FEM simulation and photoluminescence (PL) experimental results showed the difference of packaging induced thermal stress based on different packaging structures. Spectrally resolved spectrum of LDA showed the packaging induced stress is highest in the middle and rapidly drops near both ends of laser bar, in agreement with our theoretical simulation, resulting in spectral broadening due to blue shifting the lasing wavelength of the center emitter more than the edge emitters.
High power density as the critical performance of laser diode pumps significantly affects both efficiency and power of a solid state laser. In this report, we designed a new packaging structure that two laser bars bonded on the top and bottom of a MCC, respectively, to achieve higher power density at the same bias current or the same power density at a reduced bias current with respective to one laser bar on a MCC. We achieve 1KW output power at a lower bias current 450A with 2.3W/A slope efficiency from a dual-bar MCC at a duty cycle of 8% (200 μs/400 Hz). Other performances like spectral width broadening, wavelength shift and reliability about 1KW quasi-CW high power laser diodes and 5KW for one vertical stack with five dual-bar micro-channel coolers (MCCs) also are discussed. The reliability of dual-bar MCC packaging structure is also studied by life-time testing, and the output peak power of all devices degraded less than 5% after working for 1353 hours.
KEYWORDS: Near field, Laser bonding, Packaging, Semiconductor lasers, Copper, Optical simulations, High power lasers, Diodes, Near field optics, Optical engineering
Due to thermal stress, each emitter in a semiconductor laser bar or array is vertically displaced along the p-n junction; the result is that each emitter is not in a line, called near-field nonlinearity. Near-field nonlinearity along a laser bar (also known as “SMILE” effect) degrades the laser beam brightness, which causes an adverse effect on optical coupling and beam shaping. A large SMILE value causes a large divergence angle after collimation and a wider line after collimation and focusing. We simulate the factors affecting the SMILE value of a high-power diode laser array on a microchannel cooler (MCC). According to the simulation results, we have fabricated a series of laser bars bonded on MCCs with lower SMILE value. After simulation and experiment analysis, we found the key factor to affect SMILE is the deformation of the thin MCC because of the distribution of strain and stress in it. We also decreased the SMILE value of 1-cm-wide full bar AuSn bonded on MCCs from 12 to 1 μm by balancing force on MCC to minimize the deformation.
KEYWORDS: Laser bonding, Indium, Laser welding, Optical simulations, Near field, Packaging, Semiconductor lasers, High power diode lasers, Copper, Near field optics
High power laser diodes have been found a wide range of industrial, space, medical applications, characterized by high conversion efficiency, small size, light weight and a long lifetime. However, due to thermal induced stress, each emitter in a semiconductor laser bar or array is displaced along p-n junction, resulting of each emitter is not in a line, called Near-field Non-linearity. Near-field Non-linearity along laser bar (also known as “SMILE”) determines the outcome of optical coupling and beam shaping [1]. The SMILE of a laser array is the main obstacle to obtain good optical coupling efficiency and beam shaping from a laser array. Larger SMILE value causes a larger divergence angle and a wider line after collimation and focusing, respectively. In this letter, we simulate two different package structures based on MCC (Micro Channel Cooler) with Indium and AuSn solders, including the distribution of normal stress and the SMILE value. According to the theoretical results, we found the distribution of normal stress on laser bar shows the largest in the middle and drops rapidly near both ends. At last, we did another experiment to prove that the SMILE value of a laser bar was mainly affected by the die bonding process, rather than the operating condition.
High power laser diodes have found a wide range of industrial, space, medical applications, characterized by high conversion efficiency, small size, light weight and a long lifetime. In this investigation, high power 940 nm laser bars were mounted on optimized micro-channel heat sinks (MCC) using AuSn/CuW and In Soldering schemes. The optimized MCC cooler has decreased pressure drop and increased heat-sinking capability. The improvements in thermal and strain characteristics will be reported through wavelength, thermal rollover, spatial spectrum, SMILE, and polarization.
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