Optical modulation study of repaired damage morphologies of fused silica by scalar diffraction theory

The cone and Gaussian repaired damage craters are two typical morphologies induced by CO2 laser evaporation and nonevaporation technologies. The mathematical models are built for these two types of repaired craters, and the light modulation at 355 nm induced by the millimeter-scale repaired damage morphology is studied by scalar diffraction theory. The results show that the modulation of the Gaussian repaired morphology has one peak and then decreases with the increasing distance from 0 to 30 cm. While the modulation for cone repaired morphology remains stable after decreasing quickly with the increasing distance. When the horizontal radius increases, the modulation looks like a saw-tooth. However, the modulation has irregular variations for two kinds of morphologies with the increasing vertical depth. The simulated results agree well with experimental results. The horizontal and vertical dimensions, and downstream distance have different influences on the modulation. The risk of damage to downstream optical components can be suppressed to improve the stability of the optical system if the shape and size of repaired craters are well controlled and the positions of downstream optical components are selected appropriately. (C) 2017 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)