Solid-State Pockels-Cell Driver Development

2012:

To meet the demands of both the OMEGA and OMEGA EP lasers, LLE tests and refines its own design of a solid-state Pockels-cell driver. The motivation behind this new design is to replace the currently used pulsers that suffer from the degradation and ultimate failure of a thyratron electron tube–the single-action “closing” switch that performs the basic pulse-generation function within the current design.

A vital component in the OMEGA laser, a Pockels cell is an electro-optic crystal that, when a voltage is applied to it, rotates the polarization of laser light coming through the device. Depending on the voltage employed, the Pockels cell, combined with a polarizer, can either let light pass through unabated or completely reflect light, effectively establishing an optical switch. The operation of a Pockels cell requires timed rectangular electrical pulses from a special pulse generator, or pulser, with amplitudes ranging from hundreds of volts to tens of kilovolts and pulse widths from tens to hundreds of nanoseconds.

Shown here is Research Engineer Wade Bittle shown inspecting an all-solid-state Pockels-cell driver developed by LLE