Congressional recommendation boosts NIF funding
A US House of Representatives Appropriations Committee report has recommended that the National Ignition Facility (NIF; Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory; Livermore, CA) be funded to the tune of $364.6 million for the next fiscal year—an increase of $196.7 million over the original budget request of $194.9 million. The recommendation includes $144.7 million transferred to inertial confinement fusion from the Readiness in Technical Base and Facilities program and $25 million to further the development of high-average-power lasers. The report also called for the Department of Energy (DoE) to "complete and certify a new cost and schedule baseline for NIF." To date, the DoE has submitted an interim report calculating a total project cost of $3.26 million, and FY2001 funding recommendations will hinge on a final report due to the committee in September.
Corning Lasertron seeks sixfold growth in next two years
The board of directors at Corning Inc. (Corning, NY) has approved a $225 million expansion of the Corning Lasertron (Bedford, MA) group to increase the company's capacity for its amplification and transmission products. The latest announcement comes on the heels of the $45 million Lasertron expansion announced last spring. In aggregate, the two expansions, totaling $270 million, will increase existing capacity during the next two years by a factor of six and create about 1150 new jobs. "Currently the Lasertron group manufactures semiconductor chips for state-of-the-art pump lasers with powers as high as 225 mW," said Gerald J. Fine, vice president and general manager of Corning Photonic Technologies. "We have demonstrated powers nearly twice as high and expect to commercialize these products as part of this expansion plan."
Another 1.3-micron VCSEL approaches datacom market
Nova Crystals Inc. (San Jose, CA), a developer of laser and LED components for fiberoptic data/telecommunications applications, has announced an electrically pumped, 1.3-µm vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) with continuous-wave output power of 1 mW (without active cooling), bandwidth of 2.5 Gbit/s, operating voltage of less than 2 V, and reliable temperature operation up to 100°C. The device, based on traditional indium phosphide VCSEL technology, is essentially plug-compatible with the standard SONET/SDH transmitter modules that currently use Fabry-Perot edge-emitting laser diodes, according to the company. Nova Crystals expects to make them available for sampling and testing by October.
Excimer joint venture targets photolithography
Komatsu Ltd. (Tochigi, Japan) and Ushio Inc. (Tokyo, Japan) have signed a joint-venture agreement to create Gigaphoton Inc., a company that will focus on the development, manufacture, and marketing of excimer lasers for lithography. The companies have been working out the details of the joint venture since signing a memorandum of agreement last spring. The existing facilities and operating companies will continue to be utilized, including a research center in Hiratsuka, Kanagawa, development and production facilities in Oyama, Tochigi, and sales in Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo.
Also in the news . . .
Teledyne Technologies Inc. (Los Angeles, CA) announced that its newly formed Teledyne OptoElectronics unit has received an initial $1.8 million order from Corning Lasertron (Bedford, MA) for the contract manufacture of fiberoptic transmission laser modules to be sold to Corning Lasertron's customers. . . . JMAR Technologies Inc. (San Diego, CA) has received an additional $3.8 million of contract funding from the US Army Research Laboratory (Adelphi, MD), sponsored by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Arlington, VA), to continue development of the company's PXS laser plasma x-ray point-source technology for advanced semiconductor lithography applications.
Hassaun Jones-Bey
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