Air force high energy laser program

The purpose of this presentation is to describe selected technical aspects of the Air Force Weapons Laboratory´s high energy laser program. The presentation is introduced with a film of the Delta experiment, where a drone aircraft was destroyed in the air by a high energy laser. In order to put the technology programs in perspective, a generic high energy laser weapon system is discussed and the Air Force Weapons Laboratory technology program is overviewed. The technology areas are selected for further description devices and beam control. First, the laser devices that are being developed by the Air Force Weapons Laboratory are briefly described. In order to describe the Air Force Weapons Laboratory beam control technology program, a state-of-the-art beam control system is compared to a generic advanced beam control concept. The reliance on adaptive optics in advanced systems is pointed out and two adaptive optics systems being studied by the Air Force Weapons Laboratory are selected for further description.