Patent ID: 6865208

Claim:
A method for switching the output of two or more vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSELs) from one beam direction to another beam direction, the method comprising: providing an array of two or more vertical cavity surface emitting lasers (VCSELs), spaced apart by a selected separation gap so that the VCSELs are coherently coupled together spatially; and providing a common current source connected to all of the VCSELs to provide a simultaneous steady current biased above a selected threshold current, wherein the coherent coupling of the VCSELs produces a combined single output laser beam that, in a near field beam pattern oscillates between a first beam position and at least one beam position that differs from the first beam position, and in the far field beam pattern oscillates between a first beam direction and at least one beam direction that differs from the first beam direction.