Expansion of the channel number in spectral beam combining of fiber lasers array based on cascaded gratings

Aiming at the problem that the channel number in spectral beam combining (SBC) of fiber lasers array is limited by the narrow spectral selectivity of grating, a new scheme based on cascaded volume Bragg gratings (VBG) is proposed to expand the channel number. A system cascaded by two VBGs is presented and analyzed. A formula used to accurately determine the angle of incidence of all the channels is derived using rigorous coupled-wave analysis (RCWA). The channel number can be multiplied with increasing the number of VBGs. Numerical results show that the system based on cascaded VBGs is a good SBC combiner that has the ability to combine a large number of channels.