Power scaling of optical vortices by the filled aperture coherent beam combining technique

This paper presents a first-ever experimental demonstration of coherent beam combining for optical vortexes with topological charges from one to five realized in a Yb-doped fiber short-pulsed laser system. The combing efficiency varies depending on the topological charge and beam pattern quality generated by the spatial light modulators. The maximum combining efficiency of 96.9% was achieved for the topological charge one. These results open a pathway to high-intensity optical vortexes with enormous potential applications in science and industry by utilizing advances in light-matter interactions.