PENDAR TECHNOLOGIES LLC — Department of Defense SBIR Phase I: N202-115

Description

Pendar Technologies proposes to develop the next generation of compact, monolithic and dual-wavelength high power mid-wave infrared (MWIR) quantum cascade laser (QCL) platform for Navy and DoD applications. Our novel infrared laser source will be engineered to emit simultaneously output power more than 3 Watts in each of  the two optically transparent windows available in the MWIR, i.e. the 4.6-5.0 microns  and 3.6-4.2 microns bands. The wall-plug efficiency of the laser chip, when operated in continuous wave, will exceed 15% while maintaining a single aperture with a beam quality close to the diffraction limit. Innovations such as new means to transfer efficiently power from one low-loss integrated passive waveguide to another to achieve monolithic beam combining will be modeled. Additionally, novel bandstructure designs capable of improving the performance of two-color laser emitters over the current state-of-the-art MWIR QCLs will be implemented. The packaging of our laser source will also be engineered to have a volume of less than one cubic centimeter and weighing less than 100 grams volume less one cubic centimeter and weighing less than 100 grams.