Q-switched lasers are essential for generating high-energy, short-pulse laser outputs in applications like laser machining, LIBS, and medical procedures. Selecting the right Q-switched laser—active or passive—requires understanding their operational principles and trade-offs. This article briefly explains passive vs active Q-switch… Read More
Once thought to be impossible, blue, green and UV laser diodes have now become commonplace. These lasers are being used in a wide range of applications from blue-ray players to commercial lighting & displays to copper welding. In this post, we are going to take a look at the underlying material properties of semiconductors, GaN in particular, and how it has led to the development of blue, green and UV las… Read More
Tattoo removal is a growing industry, driven by the demand for effective and safe solutions to remove unwanted tattoos. For professionals looking to invest in a laser source for tattoo removal, selecting the right laser is critical to achieving optimal results while ensuring safety and efficiency. This article briefly explores the tattoo removal process and outlines key considerations when purchasing a laser source, highlighting specific products from RPMC Lasers that meet the needs of this ap… Read More
Expertise in Space and Aerospace Lasers For over 27 years, Bright Solutions has delivered customized pulsed Diode-Pumped Solid-State (DPSS) lasers, with more than 16,000 units deployed worldwide. Employing 60 professionals, including 30 laser engineers and PhDs, and holding ISO 9001:2015 certification, their expertise drives space and aerospace missions, powering LIDAR, ranging, and Free-Space Optical Communications (FSOC). Provid… Read More
LIDAR Lasers are used in a wide range of applications, including airborne topographic mapping, bathymetry (high-resolution mapping of the sea bottom and coastal areas), and lidar for Autonomous vehicles. The wavelength and specifications needed for these applications vary… Read More
SPIE Photonics West 2025 is just around the corner, and RPMC is excited to highlight an SPIE Q&A with Fluence Technology, one of our trusted partners, providing environmentally-stable, maintenance-free femtosecond fiber lasers. The Q&A features Bogusz Stepak, Ultrafast Laser Application Laboratory Director at Fluence, highlighting the company’s amazing products and ach… Read More
The field of neuromodulation is rapidly evolving, offering unprecedented tools to study neural mechanisms and develop therapies for neurological disorders. A recent breakthrough study explores the comparative benefits of photoacoustic (PA) and photothermal (PT) stimulation in non-genetic, high-precision neuromodulation. This research, enabled by innovative fiber emitter (FE) technology and advanced laser systems, including RPMC’s ‘One’ nanosecond laser, highlights the transformative potential of PA st… Read More
As Germany phases out nuclear power plants, the focus has shifted to alternative energy carriers, mainly hydrogen (H2) and ammonia (NH3), which can store energy generated by wind and solar power. While hydrogen shows promise, it is challenging to produce an… Read More
Dr. Sidi Aboujja from SemiNex presents two technical talks on our latest SOA array and highly reliable Triple Junction for automotive LiDAR at SPIE DCS 2023. These talks capture the technological advancements and application insights so that LiDAR can achieve long range with low cost and small form factors. The abstracts of these talks are lis… Read More
Accurate OH measurements are a growing need in combustion research, but existing sensor architectures are challenging to make economic, compact, and robust. The need for robust OH sensors is amplified in the global effort to decarbonize combustion. Many species, such as CO and CO2, have robust, high-speed laser absorption sensors targeting their fundamental vibrational bands in the mid-infrared; however, certain species like OH do not have a favorable vibrational spectrum, complicating sensing in the mid… Read More
Combat zones can be extremely chaotic. With a massive influx of sensory input, implementing clear communication, rugged tools, and reliable instrumentation is key to a successful mission. One of the most challenging tasks in any aerial combat situation is determining which assets on the ground to target and which ones to avoid. Because of this challenge, a practice, commonly referred to as “painting the target,” was developed and has been successfully deployed for many years, allowing ground forces to identify and designate targets for successful engagement by aeria… Read More
A significant and well-recognized difference between lasers and conventional, incoherent light sources, is the ability to concentrate laser emission in short pulses, with durations going down to a few femtoseconds, containing potentially only a few optical cycles. Technically, you can drive an incoherent LED source using current pulses. However, each pulse would have a maximum power (i.e. a peak power) equal to the average power of the same device if a conti… Read More
In that blog post we cited NATO standard STANAG 3733, which required that the laser beam have a divergence small enough so that 90% of its energy is on target 95% of the time assuming a 2.3 x 2.3 m target. We went on to explain that most laser designators are designed to be used at distances up to 5 km. Therefore, one of the most critical factors when choosing a laser source is the beam d… Read More
Spectroscopy is a class of analysis methods meant for chemical species identification and concentration measurement, based on emission spectra detection, if irradiated by an adequate light source. Fluorescence-based spectroscopy is one of the oldest spectroscopic techniques. This technique utilizes electron-photon interactions and relies on the absorption of high-energy photons and the subsequent emission of lower-energy, longer-wavelength fluorescence photons, with the energy difference associated with vibrationa… Read More
In actively Q-switched lasers, the user controls the pulsed laser output, so that no laser pulse emission occurs without providing a proper input signal, aka “the trigger”. Due to the trigger signal propagation through the interface electronics, the Q-switch driver chain, and the laser resonator build-up time, a time delay (Td) is present between the externally-supplied trigger signal and the actual laser pulse emitted by the laser source. The Td can show fluctuations if any electronics or optics involved in the pulse generation process have a functional varianc… Read More
Industrial laser induced breakdown spectroscopy typically involves the elemental analysis of various metals. In our previous application note titled “Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) in Biomedical Applications,” we discussed the fundamentals of the technique, emphasizing the use of q-switched diode-pumped solid-state lasers as the excitation source. In this blog post, we are going to explore the possibility of utilizing nanosecond pulsed fiber lasers as the excitation source. We will also discuss the pros and cons of that approach, specifically for the characterization of metals and metal… Read More
The popularity of laser induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) has been rapidly growing since its introduction in the 1960s, and is now used in industrial, military, scientific, and medical applications. Nowadays LIBS is rapidly becoming an indispensable tool for elemental analysis and is generally viewed as a complementary technique to other elemental methods such as mass spectrometry. Within the medical field, LIBS can be used for analyzing hard/calcified tissues, soft tissues, biomedical specimens; as well as disease detection and even during laser-guided surgery. In this a… Read More
Injection molding is a widely used process for rapidly mass-producing low cost highly uniform mechanical parts. On a cursory level, it is a relatively straight forward process by which molten material (metal, glass, polymer, etc.) is injected into a hollowed-out cavity, cooled down to solidify, and then ejected. This results in the material being permanently shaped to the internal cavity of the mold. This process has been around for hundreds if not thousands of years with the original molds being made out of clay and then broken apart to reveal the fini… Read More
Historically, Helium-Neon (HeNe) lasers were often the first choice for precision instrumentation, measurement setups and some spectroscopy applications. It was invented in 1960 and technologically it was one of the first lasers with extraordinary good parameters. The mechanical and optical design is quite simple (apart from sophisticated glasswork to make the tube itself) but the gas lasing medium and overall construction provide some intrinsic advantages. But also a number of disadv… Read More
Laser alignment can be a challenging task, but aligning a laser beam doesn’t have to be as complicated as it might seem with the right tools and proper techniques. Multiple tried-and-true methods have been developed over the years, utilized by technicians and engineers to simplify the alignment process. With the development of these methods, along with some tips and tricks, you don’t need to be a laser expert to perform your alignments with relative ease, ensuring your laser path is right where you want it to be and your beam is on target e… Read More
As discussed in previous posts, Raman spectroscopy is a rapidly growing analytical technique used in a wide variety of industries for material identification, but with so many different laser options it can be somewhat challenging to understand which laser is best for which application. To help elevate some of the confusion around this issue, we released an application note this past August titled “Multi-Mode vs. Single-Mode Lasers for Raman Spectr… Read More
Raman spectroscopy is one of the fastest growing and most diverse applications in all of laser spectroscopy. As a result, it can be rather challenging at times to sift through the wide-ranging laser options all being marketed for Raman spectroscopy. In this application note we will tackle one of the most common questions that arises when picking a laser for Raman spectroscopy; “Should I chose a single-spatial mode or multi-spatial mode laser for my application?” On the surface, this seems like a simple question since Raman is a nonlinear optical effect and therefore the tighter the beam can be focused the higher the conversion efficiency. Seemingly a single-mode laser would be preferable, but in practice there are other factors that can complicate … Read More
Laser amplifiers are an invaluable tool because they allow for a laser’s power to be increased while maintaining its basic spectral properties. In principle laser amplifier noise is no different than the amplifier noise induced in an audio system, and just as in a home stereo system the quality of the amplifier will have a tremendous effect on the quality of output signal. Therefore, in this post we will attempt to answer the question what is laser amplifier noise, and perhaps more importantly how amplifier noise can affect the overall performance of yo… Read More
The first HeNe laser was developed in 1960 at Bell Labs by Ali Javan, in conjunction with William Bennet Jr. and Donald Herriott. A helium–neon (HeNe) laser, is a type of continuously operating, or continuous wave (CW) gas laser in which the gain medium is a 10:1 mixture of helium and neon, pressurized within a glass tube. When a DC current is applied to two electrodes on opposite ends of the tube, helium atoms are excited into metastab… Read More
Mid-IR molecular spectroscopy is a rapidly developing and promising technique, enabling high-performance chemical detection and analysis for industrial or environmental purposes, with new wavelength ranges becoming commercially available. The essential component for such applications is the laser source, adapted to the specific spectral lines (the fingerprint) of the target molecule. Quantum Cascade Lasers (QCLs) are a perfectly suited solution to build such analysis… Read More
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