High-Energy Laser Optics Require Coatings in Their Own League
Sure, your laser pointer doesn’t have the power to punch through the wall, but high-fluence CO2 and other heavy-duty beasts of burden can carve through sheet metal, slice 1/4-in. steel into intricate shapes and drill smooth holes into parts that will become automobiles, electronic gadgets, weapons and medical devices. To deliver these most potent of laser beams to their targets requires optics that can withstand no small amount of punishment – even as they do their job of manip...
Photonics Spectra, September 2010