Simulation of grating compressor misalignment tolerances and mitigation strategies for chirped-pulse–amplification systems of varying bandwidths and beam sizes
Here, the effects of pulse compressor grating misalignment on the pulse duration and focusability are simulated for chirped-pulse–amplification systems of varying bandwidth, beam size, groove density, and incident angle. Tilt-alignment tolerances are specified based on a √2 drop in focused intensity, illustrating how tolerances scale with bandwidth and compressor beam size, which scales with energy when transformed via known grating damage thresholds. Grating-alignment tolerance scaling with grating groove density and incident/diffracted angles is investigated and applied to compressor design. A correlation between grating tip and in-plane rotation error sensitivity is defined and used to compensate residual out-of-plane angular dispersion, even for ultra-broadband pulses. Simulation of dispersion compensation methods after grating misalignment are shown to mitigate pulse lengthening, limited by temporal contrast degradation and higher-order effects for ultrabroad bandwidths.