Distributed active phase-locking of an all-fiber structured laser array by a stochastic parallel gradient descent (SPGD) algorithm

Coherent beam combining (CBC) of fiber laser array is a promising way to achieve high output power. Phase control is one key point to implement CBC. Appropriate feedback structures should be established to achieve phase control. Most feedback structures of CBC are established after the lasers emit to free space and consist of a set of lenses or mirrors. Those optical elements in free space may hinder array size and integration. In this paper, we demonstrated an all-fiber structured CBC method with distributed phase-locking. By adding an all-fiber measurement loop beside the main laser chain, the phase of main laser chain is appended to the measuring loop. Phases of each main laser chain are locked indirectly though the measurement loops by using stochastic parallel gradient descent (SPGD) algorithm. The principle of distributed phase-locking is also illustrated. Corresponding simulations are carried out and two-channel fiber lasers are coherently combined by this method. The experimental results show that the structure can achieve phase-locking effectively. Stable and distinct interference fringe is observed. Additionally, the structure proposed in this paper is straightforwardly building and expanding. (C) 2022 Optica Publishing Group under the terms of the Optica Open Access Publishing Agreement