Series of stacked confocal pulse stretchers for speckle reduction

Abstract

reflections per optical circuit configuration. The inclusion of the combination of different mirror separations and delay path lengths can result in very long pulse stretching, long optical delays, and minimal efficiency losses. Also, in the extended optical pulse stretcher, at least a beam splitter can be positioned relative to the center of curvature of the mirrors to ''flatten'' each of the circuits to enable the beam to propagate in the same plane (e.g., parallel to the floor). Also, the curvatures and sizes of the individual mirrors can be designed to position the beam splitter closer to one of the banks of mirrors to allow the optical pulse stretchers to properly fit in an allocated location in a laser system.

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