Lens Array Laser Deflection for High-Speed Focal Scanning
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing scanning methods, such as SLS and SLM, face challenges in achieving rapid and high-speed movements of focal regions in a working plane while maintaining high laser power, due to limitations in mirror size, weight, and laser power damage thresholds, leading to uneven heating and inefficiencies in heat transfer.
Innovation Solution
An apparatus comprising a first and second lens array with movable mirrors, where the laser radiation is partially deflected and focused through these arrays, allowing for high-speed focal region movement and rapid jumps between regions, utilizing Fourier transformation and diffraction effects to enhance scan speed without increasing angular velocity or altering focal length.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Speed
If galvanic mirrors are used to deflect laser radiation in SLS/SLM methods, then the focal region can be moved across the working plane, but the scan speed is limited to a few meters per second due to mirror size and weight constraints
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the single mirror system into multiple smaller mirrors arranged in a mirror array. Each mirror element is lightweight and can be rapidly actuated. The collective array achieves the required beam deflection capability while individual elements remain small enough for high-speed operation, resolving the contradiction between scan speed and mirror weight.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces the traditional single large mirror mechanical system with a digitally controlled mirror array system. Instead of moving one heavy mirror, multiple lightweight mirrors are independently controlled by a computer system, enabling rapid focal region movement without the inertia constraints of large single mirrors.
2Speed
If the mirror size is limited to enable rapid acceleration, then scan speed improves, but the damage threshold of the mirror is limited and laser power must be reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent distributes the laser beam across multiple mirror elements in the array. Each individual mirror handles only a portion of the total laser power, allowing the use of smaller, lighter mirrors that can accelerate rapidly while the aggregate system maintains high power capability through the combined capacity of all mirror elements.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent combines multiple low-power mirror elements into a unified mirror array system that collectively handles high laser power. Each mirror element operates within its damage threshold, but the parallel arrangement of multiple elements enables the system to process high total power while maintaining rapid acceleration capabilities.
3Stability of the object's composition
If the laser treatment is carried out by a focal region moving continuously across the working plane, then coverage is achieved, but uneven heating occurs because heat transfer depends on the shape of the cross section of the region to be heated
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the continuous scanning path into discrete focal regions, each handled by individual mirror elements in the array. This segmentation allows independent control of heating parameters for each region, enabling uniform heat distribution across the working plane by treating each segment separately rather than relying on continuous motion that creates variable heating patterns.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This solution enables scan speeds ten times higher than prior art systems, with minimized power losses and controlled intensity distribution across the working plane, allowing for efficient and rapid focal region transitions without exposing intermediate spaces to laser radiation.
Implementation Method 1
a first lens array having a plurality of lenses that are arranged next to one another and through which the laser radiation passes at least partially
Implementation Method 2
a movable, in particular, rotatable or pivotable, first mirror, which is arranged between the two lens arrays and deflects the laser radiation
Implementation Method 3
an objective lens that focuses the laser radiation, which has passed through the second lens array, into a working plane
Implementation Method 4
utilizing Fourier transformation and diffraction effects to enhance scan speed
Data Source
AI summary
An apparatus for deflecting laser radiation comprises: a first lens array comprising a plurality of first lenses arranged next to one another to permit the laser radiation to at least partially pass through the first lens array; a second lens array comprising a plurality of second lenses arranged next to one another to at least partially pass through the second lens array laser radiation that has passed through the first lens array; a rotatable or pivotable first mirror arranged between the first and second lens arrays to deflect in a direction of the second lens array the laser radiation that has passed through the first lens array; and an objective lens to focus laser radiation that has passed through the second lens array into a working plane.