Multi-wavelength,high spatial brightness operation of a phase-locked stripe-array diode laser

Stable continuous wave multi-wavelength operation of a stripe-array diode laser with an externalcavity spectral beam combining geometry is presented. In this setup each emitter of the stripe-array is forced to operate at a different wavelength, which leads to a decoupling between the usually phase-locked emitters. With a reflective diffraction grating with a period of 300 lines per mm, 33 equidistant laser lines around a center wavelength of 978 nm were realized, spanning a spectral range of 26 nm. With this novel approach near-diffraction limited emission with a beam quality of M ² < 1.2 and an output power of 450 mW was achieved. This laser light source can be used for applications requiring low temporal but high spatial coherence.