ILSC 2011 Paper #1102 (Assessing Audience Exposure at Laser Shows)

Assessing Audience Exposure at Laser Shows
Authors:
Michael Higlett, Health Protection Agency; Didcot Great Britain
John O'Hagan, Health Protection Agency; Didcot Great Britain
Presented at ILSC 2011

Lasers have been used in live entertainment since the 1970s. A high power laser beam is required to form visual effects of large image patterns generated by moving the laser beam by computer-controlled galvanometers. Many laser companies promote audience scanning. However, some patterns require the same location to be repeatedly scanned, which may lead to the potential for injury, particularly to the eye, where a person receives a burst of laser pulses as the pattern passes across the ...

ILSC 2011 Paper #103 (The Widely Varying Risk from Class 3R Laser Products in Light of the Revision of IEC 60825-1)

The Widely Varying Risk from Class 3R Laser Products in Light of the Revision of IEC 60825-1
Authors:
Karl Schulmeister, Seibersdorf Laboratories; Seibersdorf Austria
Presented at ILSC 2011

The current state of the characterisation of the risk from Class 2 and Class 3R laser products is discussed. We distinguish exposure to cw lasers from pulsed lasers, and we also distinguish between classification as small source (C-sub6 equal to 1) or classification as extended source. Due to the dependence of the damage threshold on exposure duration, Class 2 exposure does not appear to be able to induce retinal injury by thermal pathway even for exposure durations of several seconds. Class 2 can therefor...

ILSC 2011 Paper #102 (IEC TR 60825-5 Ed. 3.0 Manufacturer's Checklist - A Guide for Manufacturers Documenting Compliance with IEC 60825-1:2007 Compliance)

IEC TR 60825-5 Ed. 3.0 Manufacturer’s Checklist – A Guide for Manufacturers Documenting Compliance with IEC 60825-1:2007 Compliance
Authors:
Woody Strzelecki, Food and Drug Administration; Silver Spring MD USA
Presented at ILSC 2011

A release of IEC 60825-1:2007 necessitated to upgrade IEC TR 60825-5:2003. The new edition of the Technical Report reflects modification of the new standard relative to IEC60825-1:2001 such as the removal of LEDs from the scope of the standard for most products, modification of the definition of the apparent source size, fail safe and fail safe safety interlock definitions, human access, most restrictive position, manual reset, beam stop and attenuator, walk-in ...

ILSC 2011 Paper #101 (Orientation Guide for Laser Safety Standard Users)

Orientation Guide for Laser Safety Standard Users
Authors:
Werner Horak, Siemens AG; Munich Germany
Ronald Neuhaus, Siemens AG; Munich Germany
Presented at ILSC 2011

The task of extracting the appropriate assessment conditions for classification can be rather challenging. The safety philosophies of the different laser classes are dedicated to address several worst case use conditions. Virtually, there are up to seven laser classes available. Four of them, where the safety philosophy comprises optically aided viewing, would even require two different assessment conditions (conditions 1 and 2 in terms of IEC 60825-1). At which condition 1 is intended to situations where telescopes et...

ILSC 2011 Paper #1003 (Remote Viewing No Longer a Nice to Do)

Remote Viewing No Longer a Nice to Do
Authors:
Ken Barat, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory; Berkeley CA USA
Presented at ILSC 2011

The option of remote viewing has long been in the Laser Safety arsenal, but its application has been rather spotty. By remote viewing I mean being able to observe beam placement and interaction from a location other than bending over the optical table. Today the availability and cost of cameras to perform this task has greatly improved. Costs have gone down, and well as the size of cameras. These cameras are ideally situated for the viewing of near infrared and visible wavelengths. Leading this use of remote viewing has not been the LSO or even laser safety fir...

ILSC 2011 Paper #1002 (Assessing the Safety of Entertainment Lighting)

Assessing the Safety of Entertainment Lighting
Authors:
John O'Hagan, Health Protection Agency; Oxfordshire Great Britain
Marina Khazova, Health Protection Agency; Didcot Great Britain
Ron Bonner, Professional Lighting and Sound Association; Eastbourne Great Britain
Presented at ILSC 2011

The introduction of legislation in Europe covering worker exposure to optical radiation has presented challenges for the entertainment industry. This was highlighted following an injury to a member of staff working in front of a spotlight. Assessments were carried out on a range of lighting systems used in the entertainment industry to identify the key issues and to determine simple a...

ILSC 2009 Proceedings Soft Bound Book

The 2009 International Laser Safety Conference (ILSC) Proceedings and Program covers the comprehensive four-day conference on all aspects of laser safety practice and hazard control. All Technical sessions and workshops that addressed developments in regulatory, mandatory and voluntary safety standards for laser products and for laser use are included.

ILSC 2009 Paper #C103 (Laser Safety Management for the ORION High Intensity Laser Facility)

Laser Safety Management for the ORION High Intensity Laser Facility
Authors:
Graham White, Awe; Reading Great Britain
Steve Melton, AWE; Reading Great Britain
Presented at ILSC 2009

This paper describes the continuing development of safety arrangements for Project ORION. ORION is a high intensity MOPA configuration Nd doped glass laser facility for plasma physics research, currently in construction at AWE in the UK. In a four storey building measuring some 100m long by 60m wide by 30m high, the facility includes 10 long-pulse beams of 300mm aperture delivering 5kJ in 1ns at 351nm to target and 2 short-pulse beams of 600mm aperture utilising CPA to deliver 1PW each at ...

ILSC 2009 Paper #C102 (Laser Uplink Safety for Future NASA High-bandwidth Spacecraft Communications)

Laser Uplink Safety for Future NASA High-bandwidth Spacecraft Communications
Authors:
Keith Wilson, Jet Propulsion Laboratory; Pasadena CA USA
Presented at ILSC 2009

JPL has been continually developing optical communications technologies to support future highbandwidth communications from NASAs deep space probes. Optical communications at ranges out to Jupiter will use a laser uplink that will serve as both an uplink command link and a beacon to identify the location of the downlink receiver. Uplink laser beams are at near-infrared wavelengths, and the command data rates are megabits/sec with laser beam powers of kilowatts to mitigate the beam spreading effects of the atmosphere. This paper ...

ILSC 2009 Paper #C101 (Properties of Optical Frequency Combs)

Properties of Optical Frequency Combs
Authors:
Steven T. Cundiff, JILA, NIST and University of Colorado; Boulder CO USA
Presented at ILSC 2009

Optical frequency combs have become a very active area of research over the last decade. Their primary applications have been optical frequency metrology and optical atomic clocks, however they are also being applied to chemical sensing, length metrology, optical waveform generation and extreme nonlinear optics. I will briefly introduce frequency combs, how they are produced and why they are useful for these applications. Typically frequency combs are produced by using nonlinearity in optical fiber to spectrally broaden the output of a mode-locked laser....