FABRICATION OF 2-SIDED ANAMORPHIC MICROLENSES AND DIRECT COUPLING OF TAPERED HIGH-POWER DIODE-LASER TO SINGLE-MODE FIBER

An anamorphic microlens has been developed to couple a tapered unstable-resonator laser directly to a single-mode fiber, and has demonstrated capability for simple, compact and efficient high-power diode laser systems, For high collection and coupling efficiencies, the refractive microlens has been fabricated by utilizing both sides of a GaP substrate, in which the first side was used to remove the astigmatism of the laser output and the second side to focus the beam to a spot size comparable to the fiber mode, The microlenses have been accurately formed by using a recent technique of mass-transport smoothing of etched multimesa preforms, Initial fiber-coupling experiments showed powers as high as 360 mW at the fiber output, and coupling efficiency as high as 29.5% has been measured at a lower power.