Wave optics simulation approach for high-power laser beam combination

A numerical wave optics approach for simulating multiplex super Gaussian beam combination in high-power laser facility is presented. The approach involves the application of a sequence of random phase screens and von Karman turbulence phase to an initial beam field and the summation of the intensity results. The analytical and numerical calculation results have been given to illustrate the properties of the resulting far-field pattern after coherent, incoherent and spatially coherent combination, and some of that are compared with experimental results. The approach can be used for modeling and evaluating applications such as high-power laser shooting that might utilize different beams combining approach.

Research highlights
► We model coherent, incoherent and spatially coherent combination of super Gaussian beam.
► Increasing transverse spatial correlation length will increase coherence.
► Increasing scale length will decrease wavefront aberration.
► The high-power laser beam combinations can be simulated in this way.