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a r t i c l e in fo
abstract
Article history:
Received 20 December 2009
Received in revised form
10 February 2010
Accepted 23 June 2010
Available online 17 July 2010
The automation of CO2 laser output power measurement is discussed in this paper as a function of the
absorber gas pressure in a cell located inside or outside the laser cavity. A manually tunable laser was
used which can be operated in one of about 44 different laser lines aligned by the user and registered
respectively by the acquisition program for further analysis.
The voltages representing the absorber gas pressure and the output power were very small (a few
hundred mV), therefore a proper voltage amplication circuit was designed to amplify the analog
outputs of both the pressure meter and the laser output power meter. These amplied signals were
then applied directly to a PCI-9112 ADLINK data acquisition card using a personal computer (PC).
A suitable controlling program using LabVIEW graphical programming language was written to
measure the pressure and laser power signals, draw the relationship between them and save the results
for later processing and analysis; such as, gas absorbance coefcient a, mean absorption cross section s
calculations that can be applied in many areas such as molecular spectroscopy and environmental
pollution studies.
& 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
CO2 laser
Pirani
LabVIEW
1. Introduction
As known, CO2 lasers are widely implemented in scientic,
medical and industrial applications; for example, in infrared
radar, surgery, spectroscopy, welding and material processing.
That is mainly because of their interesting features such as good
frequency selection, relatively narrow bandwidth, relatively highpower and high efciency. Generally, the CO2 laser output power
and efciency depend on many factors such as gas pressure,
applied voltage and the dissociation of CO2 to CO molecules [1].
Recently, computers have entered the world of physical
experiments in a very decisive way. However, while researchers
are using them frequently as a tool, they still design and run the
experiments by themselves. In a computer-based physical
experiment, the computer obeys the controlling program instructions to collect and record the generated data through some sort
of interfacing, and can be used to analyze the obtained data, carry
out necessary calculations and nally present and save the results
in different forms [2].
From the time of its invention, the laser power meter was
generally comprised of two parts: a measurement head and a
display box. It was always considered better to have such an
arrangement with a cable connecting the two because of the
hazardous nature of the laser beam. Nowadays the PC is an
indispensable part of the ofce and the laboratory, and it is
0030-3992/$ - see front matter & 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.optlastec.2010.06.008
2. Experimental setup
At the start of the experiment, the laser is turned on after
evacuating the absorption cell to reach a vacuum of about
10 2 mbar or less.
452
1
C0 1=C1 U C2 U 2 C3 U 3 C6 U 6
Table 1
Dual trans transmitter specications.
Measuring range
Output voltage micro-Pirani
Output voltage Piezo
Min
Max
Unit
1 10 5
0
0
2000
10
2
mbar
V
V
CO2
Spectrum
Analyzer
MD10
Laser
power
meter
PIZA 1000
Pressure
meter
Fig. 1. The automation system for the measurements of laser CO2 vs. absorber gas pressure.
453
Table 2
Atmospheric air coefcients.
Atmospheric air constants
0.0278168
0.1371869
0.0602274
0.0148662
0.0000121
C0
C1
C2
C3
C6
519 k R2
1 K R4
100n
7
R1
3
OP177
ANALOG OUT
J1
BF245
3
1
Q1
2
U1
-
100n
3
OP177
+
U2
-
C3
C5
100n
R3
2K
11.5 K
C4
7
30p C1
C2
+15V
1N4148
D1
+15V
1 K R5
100n
-15V
-15V
3
Pin 5 (Pressure Connector)
OP177
+
U3
100n
+15V
C8
7
C6
1 K R10
1N4148
D2
+15V
30p
15.4 K
1 K R8
C10
61.9 k R7
R6
BF245
3
1
Q2
2
3
OP177
100n
U4
C7
C9
100n
R9
2K
100n
-15V
-15V
1 2 3 4
1 K R11
1 K R12
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
DAQ Connector
+
U5
BF245
3
1
Q3
2
3
OP177
+
U6
4
-15V
C12
100n
100n
C14
R13
2K
3
OP177
100n
C13
7
Pressure Connector
+15V
1N4148
D3
C11
30p
+15V
C15
5 6 7 8
100n
-15V
454
1
P0
ln
L
P
0:41 1016 a
p
Fig. 7. Laser power vs. pressure (absorber cell outside the laser cavity).
Fig. 8. Gas absorption coefcient vs. pressure (absorber cell outside the laser cavity).
455
456
Resolution: 12-bit
Three A/D trigger modes: software trigger, programmable
pacer trigger, and external pulse trigger.
Conversion Time: 8 ms
Fig. 9. Laser power vs. pressure (left) and absorption coefcient (a) vs. pressure (right), for 5 experiments of laser line 9R (14) (where the absorber cell is located outside
the laser cavity).
Fig. 10. Laser power vs. pressure (left) and P/P0 vs. pressure (right), for ve experiments of laser line 9P (22) (where absorber cell is located inside the laser cavity).
Fig. 11. Laser power vs. pressure graphs for three different laser lines: 9P (10), 9P (12), 9P (14) (absorber gas: Freon CFC-11).
457
Fig. 12. a vs. pressure graphs for three different laser lines: 9P (14), 9P (16), 9P (18) (absorber gas: Freon CFC-11).
Start
Operation Mode.vi
Select Operation Mode
EXIT
Retrieve Data
New Measurement.vi
NO
Retrieve data.vi
RETURN
YES
Flow Chart 1. Main power vs. pressure.
Exit to WINDOWS
458
Band and branch No.: There are two types of laser bands:
10.6 and 9.6mm, determined by band number. Each band
has two branches (P and R) determined by branch number.
So, nally we get four branches (9P, 9R, 10P, 10R), each
containing 11 different laser lines. According to this selection,
the program displays the laser line wavelength and wave
number.
START
Select Absorber Cell Location & Length , Laser Band and Branch, Used Gas Type, Sampling Rate and No. of Readings
Start
Measurement
Pressed?
NO
YES
Acquire Laser Power, Pressure &
Simultaneous Display on Graph
NO
NO
YES
Save Results?
Stop
Measurement
Pressed?
Save Results
NO
Return
pressed?
YES
RETURN TO MAIN VI
YES
Show Graph
NO
NO
Power vs.
Pressure
Selected?
YES
YES
vs. Pressure
Selected?
YES
YES
Display Power vs. Pressure
NO
Power vs. Piezo
Selected?
Display
vs. Pressure
NO
459
Start
No
No
Is OK pressed?
Is single Line
tagged?
Yes
Is Multiline
tagged?
No
Is Cancel
pressed?
Yes
Yes
Yes
Go to
Main Power vs. Pressure.vi
Is Multiline
tagged?
No
No
Execute Multiline VI
(Band display.vi)
Yes
Untag first tagged option
(single line or multiline)
Multiline
tagged?
No
Yes
Execute
Single Line graph.vi
No
Yes
Select file Names
No
No
Is Cancel
pressed?
Is OK
pressed?
No
Export simplified
image.bmp
Is Exit clicked?
Choose save to
clipboard or save to
file
Yes
Go to
Main Laser p vs.p..vi
Yes
Yes
No
Is Cancel
pressed?
Is Save
pressed?
Select proper path to save image
At c:\laserPower\......\images
Yes
Is Cancel
pressed?
No
save image
Yes
Go to
Main Laser p vs.p..vi
Is Exit clicked?
No
460
Display the graph of laser power vs. pressure (in the Piezo
range).
5. Program hierarchy
The following ow charts represent the various steps of the
program:
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to express their sincere gratitude to
Dr. Ibrahim Othman, General director of the Syrian Atomic
Energy Commission for his continuous support, guidance and
encouragement; and Dr. Ali Al-Mohamad, the Head of Scientic
Services Department and Dr. Shraif Al-Hawatt, the researcher
in Physics department, for their help in accomplishing this
project.
References
[1] Soukieh M, Abdul Ghani B, Hammadi M. Frontiers in lasers and electrooptics research. New York: Nova Science Publishers Inc.; 2006. 290 p
[Chapter 7].
[2] Chakrabarti Bhupati. Computers and physics experiments. Current Science
2006;91(3).
[3] Ilan Haber. Power and energy meters: from sensors to PC. Ophir Optronics Ltd,
Laser measurement instruments web site, /http://www.ophiropt.com/laser-mea
surement-instruments/laser-power-energy-meters/tutorial/from-sensors-to-pcS.
[4] Al-Hawat S, Saloum S, Zidan MD. Absorption of CO2 laser emission by freon-12.
Applied Physics B 2004;78:43942.
[5] SCIENTECH. MENTOR Laser Power and Energy Measurement System. Type
MD10, Setup and Operating Procedures.
[6] LMVAC. Multi-range vacuum gauge. Type PIZA 1000, operation manual.
[7] ADLINK: NuDAQ/NuIPC 9112 series multi-function DAS cards for PCI/3U
CompactPCI users guide. ADLINK PCI/CompactPCI DAQ cards software
installation guide. PCIS-LVIEW, LabVIEW interface of NuDAQ PCI cards,
Windows 98/NT/2000/XP (function reference and users guide).