Volume Bragg Gratings: Fundamentals and Applications in Laser Beam Combining and Beam Phase Transformations

Abstract

Two major volume Bragg grating (VBG) applications will be presented and in particular laser beam combining and holographically encoded phase masks. Laser beam combining is an approach where multiple lasers are combined to produce more power. Spectral beam combining is a technique in which different wavelengths are superimposed spatially (combined) using a dispersive element such as a volume Bragg grating. To reduce the complexity of such combining system instead of multiple individual VBGs, it will be demonstrated that a single holographic element with multiple VBGs recorded inside could be used for the same purpose. Similar multiplex volume holographic elements could be used for coher ent beam combining. In this case, the gratings operate at the same wavelength and have degenerate output. Such coherent combining using gratings written in photothermorefractive (PTR) glass will be discussed. The chapter also demonstrates that binary phase profiles may be encoded into volume Bragg gratings, and that for any probe beam capable of satisfying the Bragg condition of the hologram, this phase profile will be present in the diffracted beam. A multiplexed set of these holographic phase masks (HPMs) can simultaneously combine beams while also performing mode conversion. An approach for making HPMs fully achromatic by combining them with a pair of surface gratings will be outlined.Keywords: holography, volume Bragg gratings, beam combining, phase plates, photothermo refractive glass, multiplexed volume gratings © 2017 The Author(s). Licensee InTech. This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Volume Bragg gratings Description and propertiesVolume grating as its name suggest is a grating that occupies the volume of a medium. Typically, for such gratings the term volume Bragg gratings (VBGs) is used in relation to Sir William Bragg who in 1915 used diffraction of light propagating through a crystal to determine the crystal's lattice structure [1]. What he found was that at certain conditions the light is strongly diffracted by the crystal. Such condition is called "resonant condition" or also "Bragg condition." Here is also the place to make the distinction between surface and volume Bragg gratings. If we start with a surface grating and start increasing its thickness at some point the different diffraction orders will reduce to a moment where there will be only one order. This defines the transition to a volume grating behavior [2].There are two basic types of VBGs which is shown in Figure 1. The first one is a transmission Bragg grating (TBG) for which if the incident light satisfies the Bragg condition it is not transmitted but also diffracted. The second type is a reflection Bragg grating (RBG) which behaves like a mirror for incoming light that matches the Bragg condition.For simplicity, in Figure 1, fo...