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Details of Grant 

EPSRC Reference: GR/M40295/01
Title: NEW QUASI PHASE MATCHED NONLINEAR MATERIALS AND THEIR APPLICATION TO OPTICAL PARAMETRIC OSCILLATORS
Principal Investigator: Ward, Dr RCC
Other Investigators:
Researcher Co-Investigators:
Project Partners:
DSTL
Department: Oxford Physics
Organisation: University of Oxford
Scheme: Standard Research (Pre-FEC)
Starts: 01 October 1998 Ends: 31 March 2002 Value (£): 199,954
EPSRC Research Topic Classifications:
Lasers & Optics Materials Characterisation
EPSRC Industrial Sector Classifications:
No relevance to Underpinning Sectors
Related Grants:
Panel History:  
Summary on Grant Application Form
Quasi-phase-matched (QPM) nonlinear materials, such as periodically-poled lithium niobate (PP-LN), have had a major impact on current developments in nonlinear optics, particularly in applications involving optical parametric oscillators (OPOs). This programme combines the development of a new class of QPM materials, the arsenates and phosphates (KT?, KTA, RTA), which exhibit superior thermal, optical damage resistance and infrared transmission properties to PP-LN itself, with their application to novel CW OPOs. In a coordinated programme involving four institutions, and which aims to further enhance the UK's international leadership position in this area, it includes the growth of the basic crystalline materials together with their electric-field-induced periodic poling, and their subsequent application in a study aimed at developing and investigating practical intracavity and pump-enhanced OPOs as sources of CW coherent radiation for the mid-infrared from 1 to >5 wm at power levels around 1 W. Novel diagnostic techniques, based on dielectric spectroscopy and reciprocal space mapping, will be developed for material assessment, in relation to both growth and poling, with the aim of gaining a thorough understanding of the crystal characteristics that promotellimit the poling process in the arsenates and phosphates. Intracavity OPOs, which have the advantages of low threshold, high conversion efficiency, and compact size, will be designed, developed and investigated along with related frequency up-conversion devices to provide sources of CW coherent radiation which are continuously tunable over greater than a decade from 410nm to >S~im at power levels from 0.1 to 1 W.
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Organisation Website: http://www.ox.ac.uk