Blue laser diode with high optical power from OSRAM Opto Semiconductors

With the new high power laser diode PL TB450, OSRAM Opto Semiconductors strengthens its leading role in lasers on indium-gallium-nitride basis. Mounted in a compact TO56 package, the blue laser diode features an optical power of 1.4 Watt (W). Thus it is particularly suitable for high-quality projectors in the professional field. Other applications for this high power component reach from laser systems for stage and decoration illumination to medical applications.

Professional projectors with a luminous flux of more than 1000 lumen are the main area of application for the new laser diode PL TB450. With its wavelength of 450 nanometer (nm), it produces exactly the wanted blue, and with 1.4 W (at room temperature and a current of 1.2 A) the high optical power required.

Thanks to its excellent efficiency of 27 percent (ratio of light produced to electric power consumed), the temperature of the laser will rise only slightly. Hence it boasts a long service life – depending on its use up to 10,000 hours at 40°C in continuous operation. The long lifetime of the laser diodes facilitates a maintenance-free operation of projectors at low energy consumption.

There are various approaches for the use of the laser diode in a professional projector: Usually red LEDs are combined with blue high power lasers. The green color emerges when blue lasers excite a special phosphor to emit light. Red light can also be generated this way so that the projector light source can be designed without red LED, thus turning out even smaller, if so required.

“By starting serial production of a blue high power laser diode in the 1-Watt power range we further strengthen our leading role in the field of blue lasers,” emphasizes Dr. Thomas Hoefer, Head of R&D for infrared products and lasers at OSRAM Opto Semiconductors. “When developing these diodes we were able to draw on many years of experience with other types of lasers. And we could also implement the results of publicly funded research projects.”

The basic technologies for indium-gallium-nitride laser diodes had been developed in the course of the MOLAS Project, supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research.