Date of download: 9/17/2016 Copyright © 2016 SPIE. All rights reserved. A lens collimates or focuses a single TE mode laser diode beam. The dot curves depict a collimated beam. The dash and solid curves depict two focused beams with different focusing distance, respectively. At cross section A, the beam depicted by solid curves has the smallest spot. At cross section B, the beam depicted by dash curves has the smallest spot. At cross section C, the beam depicted by dot curves has the smallest spot. Figure Legend: From: Analysis of delivering a laser diode beam with the smallest spot Opt. Eng. 2012;51(1): doi: /1.OE

Date of download: 9/17/2016 Copyright © 2016 SPIE. All rights reserved. A collimated or focused single TE mode laser beam with waist located at i(o) and waist radius w0′(o). Figure Legend: From: Analysis of delivering a laser diode beam with the smallest spot Opt. Eng. 2012;51(1): doi: /1.OE

Date of download: 9/17/2016 Copyright © 2016 SPIE. All rights reserved. The dot curve is the beam image distance versus object distance referred to the vertical axis at the right hand side of the graph. The five solid curves are beam spot radius versus object distance referred to the vertical axis at the left hand side of the graph. The solid curve with fork symbol is for beam delivery distance of 5 m, the solid curve with open square symbol is for beam delivery distance of 10 m, the solid curve with open circle symbol is for beam delivery distance of 20 m, the solid curve with open triangle symbol is for beam delivery distance of 50 m, and the solid curve with cross symbol is for beam delivery distance of 100 m Figure Legend: From: Analysis of delivering a laser diode beam with the smallest spot Opt. Eng. 2012;51(1): doi: /1.OE

Date of download: 9/17/2016 Copyright © 2016 SPIE. All rights reserved. For a single TE mode laser diode, the five open solid squares are the beam smallest spot radii at five delivery distances, respectively. The dash curve is the spot radius when the beam is collimated. Figure Legend: From: Analysis of delivering a laser diode beam with the smallest spot Opt. Eng. 2012;51(1): doi: /1.OE

Date of download: 9/17/2016 Copyright © 2016 SPIE. All rights reserved. Schematic of a high power laser diode with a multi transverse mode beam. Figure Legend: From: Analysis of delivering a laser diode beam with the smallest spot Opt. Eng. 2012;51(1): doi: /1.OE

Date of download: 9/17/2016 Copyright © 2016 SPIE. All rights reserved. Schematic of a lens collimating orfocusing a high power laser diode multi TE mode beam. a is the active layer width which is exaggerated for illustration purpose, b is the baseline spot size at delivery distance i, and c is the spot size. Propagation of the TE mode at the edge of the active layer is depicted. Figure Legend: From: Analysis of delivering a laser diode beam with the smallest spot Opt. Eng. 2012;51(1): doi: /1.OE

Date of download: 9/17/2016 Copyright © 2016 SPIE. All rights reserved. Schematic of a high power laser diode stack. The light source size can be considered as a by a′. Figure Legend: From: Analysis of delivering a laser diode beam with the smallest spot Opt. Eng. 2012;51(1): doi: /1.OE

Date of download: 9/17/2016 Copyright © 2016 SPIE. All rights reserved. An off-shelve laser diode collimating lens can either collimate a single TE mode laser diode beam or focus a collimated single TE mode laser diode beam, with negligible aberration in both cases. Two such lenses used in a pair can focus a single TE mode laser diode beam with negligible aberration. Figure Legend: From: Analysis of delivering a laser diode beam with the smallest spot Opt. Eng. 2012;51(1): doi: /1.OE