RPMC Lasers Blog

Interferometry is one of the most widely used precision measurement techniques known to humankind.  The precision provided by interferometers has enabled countless scientific discoveries and breakthroughs.  These range from the Michelson and Morley...

As most people already understand, a laser diodes performance is highly dependent on its operating temperature, which is why most mid- to high-end laser packages utilize embedded thermoelectric coolers (TECs).  The strong temperature dependence arises...

As discussed in a previous blog post, flow cytometry is an extremely valuable methodology employed by scientists around the world for analyzing individual cells via fluorescence tagging.  In that blog titled “Flow Cytometry Review,” we went to great...

Over the past year, we here at RPMC Lasers have published several different pieces of technical content on various LIDAR applications.  Some of our more recent posts include a white paper titled “Single Frequency Fiber Lasers for Doppler LIDAR," and a...

  Diode lasers are unique amongst most other laser sources for their extensive range of available wavelengths.   The breadth of output wavelengths has allowed diodes to become one of the most versatile laser sources, with wavelengths available from...

RPMC Lasers has made this blog post to show the top three aesthetic laser applications our customers have worked on. Our team of laser experts have over 100 years of combined experience working with our customers, and during that time, we have helped...

Bathymetry is the study of the underwater depth in oceans, lakes, or seas and is used to generate detailed topographical maps of bodies of water around the world.  While there are several different methods of underwater mapping including sonar, in...

Fluorescence microscopy is deployed widely in biological sciences for identifying the spatial distribution of molecules of interest in complex heterogeneous samples, including living cells.  Over the past 100 years, this method has been heavily...

Last year we published a blog post on the subject of combining active imaging and night vision by using time-of-flight (TOF) gated lidar to produce three-dimensional images of a target without the need for visible light.  We will revisit this topic,...

RPMC Lasers has always prided itself on our willingness and ability to provide system integrators with customized laser packaging solutions.  Our team of laser diode experts has been working as the interface between our customers and suppliers for...

For any laser to function, there must be more gain inside the laser cavity than loss, and the point at which the laser gain is just large enough to overcome the cavity loss enabling lasing is called gain threshold.  While simple, in theory, this...

RPMC Lasers, has partnered with Integrated Optics, for several years now, to provide our customers with high-quality compact diode-pumped solid-state (DPSS) and diode laser modules.   In order to meet growing production demands, Integrated Optics...

At RPMC, we are excited to announce the release of our newest white paper titled "Fundamentals of Confocal Raman Microscopy."  While there are many white papers out there which focus heavily on the spectroscopy aspects of this application, we have...

Here at RPMC Lasers, we have over 20 years of experience helping the photonics community with their solid-state laser needs.  Over this time, we have answered a wide range of questions from both end users and system integrators, ranging from...

Introduction

Laser Diode Fundamentals: Fiber Coupling (Part 2 of 2)

Last fall, we published a blog titled “Micromachining Lasers for Anti-Counterfeiting,” where we explored how laser micromachining can be used to embed microscopic two-dimensional identification codes directly onto the item of interest.   In addition...

Laser Diode Fundamentals: Fiber Coupling (Part 1 of 2)

Microchip lasers have been around since 1989 when they were first produced at MIT’s Lincoln Labs, but it wasn’t until recently that they have become commonplace in the commercial laser market.  As such, they are still somewhat misunderstood. In this...

Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) is one of the most popular laser based atomic spectroscopy techniques on the market today.  Nowadays, LIBS is rapidly becoming an indispensable tool for elemental analysis and is generally viewed as a...

Flow cytometry is a method for simultaneously analyzing multiple physical properties of an individual cell as it flows through a beam of light in a fluid stream, including the cells size and fluorescence.   In practice, flow cytometry is essentially a...

Introduction In the past RPMC has taken a look at laser diode lifetime in both a white paper titled “How to Improve Laser Diode Lifetime! Advice and Precautions on Mounting,” and an application note called “Understanding Laser Diode Lifetime.” ...

In the last installment of our Laser Diode Fundamentals series, we took a deep dive into the underlying physical properties behind the longitudinal mode structure of laser diodes.  In that blog post, we explained the advantages and disadvantages to...

Flashlamp pumped pulsed Er:YAG lasers have been widely utilized in dermatology and dentistry as an alternative to CO2 lasers, but historically continuous wave (CW) and quasi-continuous wave (QCW) Er:YAG lasers were problematic due to their unique...

Introduction  Methane (CH4) is the principal component in natural gas making up about 97% of its concentration, with the remainder consisting of small amounts of more complex hydrocarbons like ethane (C2H6), propane (C3H8), butane (C4H10), and pentane...