Tester Center for Laser Optics

For work under low-dust environmental conditions, particularly in the field of optics qualification, the Institute of Technical Physics has a clean room with a total of five class ISO 5 laboratories covering 203 square metres. The particle concentration, room temperature and humidity of these laboratories are constantly monitored. The clean room contains an experimental set-up for measuring laser-induced damage thresholds and two set-ups for analysing laser-induced molecular contamination. In addition, there are two diagnostic laboratories that are used to analyse damage and deposits on laser optics, but are also available for other work at the institute. The analytical equipment includes a differential interference contrast (DIC) microscope, a white light interference microscope, an atomic force microscope and a scanning electron microscope. The SEM is equipped with an energy-dispersive X-ray detector and offers the possibility of working in a low vacuum, so that no additional sputtering of the optical samples to be analysed with gold is necessary. Two FT-IR spectrometers are also available for the spectral analysis of optical components.