A high-power continuous-wave polycrystalline 1% Nd:Y3Al5O12 (Nd:YAG) ceramic rod laser was demonstrated. With 290 W/808 nm laser diode pumping, cw laser output of 72 W was obtained at 1064 nm. The optical-to-optical conversion efficiency is 24.8%. Thermally induced birefringence properties of Nd:YAG ceramic was also investigated.

We successfully implemented laser beam wavefront correction on the 200 TW laser system at the Advanced Laser Light Source. Ultra high intensities in excess of 10(20) W/cm(2) have been demonstrated. This system is, to our knowledge, the first 100 TW class laser to combine simultaneously ultra high intensity, 10(9) laser pulse contrast ratio and 10 Hz high repetition rate.

We report the main parameters of a nine-electrode bimorph piezoelectric adaptive mirror designed to correct low-order aberrations. We describe measurements of the control coefficients for defocus, astigmatism, pure coma, and spherical aberration of this mirror and the temperature stability of its profile. The performance of a simple adaptive optical system for imaging through laboratory-generated turbulence is investigated. This low-order device is suitable for small (<1-m-diameter) telescopes and for nonastronomical applications of adaptive optics.

We discuss the use of liquid-crystal phase modulators (LCPM's) both as a repeatable disturbance test source and as an adaptive optics corrector. LCPM's have the potential to induce controlled, repeatable, dynamic aberrations into optical systems at low cost, low complexity, and high flexibility. Because they are programmable and can be operated as transmissive elements, they can easily be inserted into the optical path of an adaptive optics system and used to generate a disturbance test source. When used as wave-front correctors they act as a piston-only segmented mirror and have a number of advantages. These include low operating power requirements, relatively low cost, and compact size. Laboratory experiments with a Meadowlark LCPM are presented. We first describe use of the LCPM as a repeatable disturbance generator for testing adaptive optics systems. We then describe a closed-loop adaptive optics system using the LCPM as the wave-front corrector. The adaptive optics system includes a Shack-Hartmann wave-front sensor operated with a zonal control algorithm.