NIF Optical Materials and Fabrication Technologies: An Overview
2004
The high-energy/high-power section of the NIF laser system contains 7360 meter-scale optics. Advanced optical
materials and fabrication technologies needed to manufacture the NIF optics have been developed and put into
production at key vendor sites. Production rates are up to 20 times faster and per-optic costs 5 times lower than could be
achieved prior to the NIF. In addition, the optics manufactured for NIF are better than specification giving laser
performance better than the design. A suite of custom metrology tools have been designed, built and installed at the
vendor sites to verify compliance with NIF optical specifications. A brief description of the NIF optical wavefront
specifications for the glass and crystal optics is presented. The wavefront specifications span a continuous range of
spatial scale-lengths from 10 μm to 0.5 m (full aperture). We have continued our multi-year research effort to improve
the lifetime (i.e. damage resistance) of bulk optical materials, finished optical surfaces and multi-layer dielectric
coatings. New methods for post-processing the completed optic to improve the damage resistance have been developed
and made operational. This includes laser conditioning of coatings, glass surfaces and bulk KDP and DKDP and well as
raster and full aperture defect mapping systems. Research on damage mechanisms continues to drive the development
of even better optical materials.
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