Patent ID: 7342947

Claim:
A method of providing a collimated output from a plurality of lasers, comprising: coupling each output from each laser of the plurality of lasers to a separate optical fiber in a plurality of optical fibers combining the plurality of optical fibers to form a reflective surface receiving the outputs from the plurality of lasers; coupling fractions of light output from each optical fiber into other optical fibers to stimulate self-organized phasing of the plurality of lasers; and configuring the combination of the plurality of optical fibers to discriminate in favor of a flat wavefront output from the combination of the plurality of optical fibers; wherein at least one optical fiber in the plurality of optical fibers is an interferometrically dark fiber; wherein the interferometrically dark fiber is configured to transmit no light due to destructive interference between light from a laser coupled to the interferometrically dark fiber and the fractions of light output from adjacent optical fibers.