Patent ID: 7058098

Claim:
A coherent laser beam combining system comprised of: a. a master oscillator having a laser output signal; b. a 1×N power splitter, whereby the output signal of the master oscillator is split into a plurality of N output signals; c. means for phase modulating each of the N output signals of said power splitter with a unique electronic frequency, whereby the modulation frequencies are selected such that a phase error signal for each of the N phase modulated output signals can be uniquely isolated; d. N optical phase adjusting elements for receiving said N phase modulated signals and outputting N phase modulated signals; e. means for amplifying said N modulated output signals; f. means for optically co-aligning said N amplified signals; g. means for sampling said N optically aligned signals; h. an imaging system for directing said N sampled signals onto a photodetector; i. means for signal processing the output of said photodetector, thereby to isolate and extract phase control signals for each of the N output signals and to apply said phase control signals to said N optical phase adjusting elements using negative feedback to cancel the phase difference between the N array element signals, thereby resulting in a high-powered optically-coherent laser beam output.