title: Beam homogenizer for hollow-fiber delivery system of excimer laser light.
abstract: A beam homogenizer for a hollow-fiber-based, UV laser delivery system is proposed. A rectangular glass waveguide with an inner aluminum coating that has a 1-mm square cross section is attached at the output end of the circular-core hollow fiber with a 1-mm inner diameter. The rectangular waveguide generates a number of higher-order modes and results in a uniform top-hat profile. The configuration of the waveguide is designed by a ray-tracing technique so that both the low transmission loss and the high uniformity in the output beam are obtained. The fabricated waveguide shows a low loss of 0.4 dB, and the intensity variation coefficient is 7%. The output beam from the rectangular waveguide is expanded by a lens to the size larger than 10-mm square. It is also shown that the profile does not change with the bending condition.
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical Communications, Tohoku University, 05 Aoba, Aramaki, Sendai 980-8579, Japan. yuji@ecei.tohoku.ac.jp
authors.forename: Yuji
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Matsuura
authors.forename: Daisuke
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Akiyama
authors.forename: Mitsunobu
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Miyagi