Orlando, FL – October 31, 2023 – The Laser Institute (LIA) is thrilled to announce the recipient of the prestigious Arthur L. Schawlow Award for 2023. This year, the award goes to the esteemed Dr.-Ing. E. h. Peter Leibinger for his outstanding contributions in laser technology, his commercial success, and his accomplishments as an industry leader.
Started in 1982, the Arthur L. Schawlow Award is one of LIA’s highest honors, named after the esteemed physicist and laser pioneer, Dr. Arthur Schawlow. This award is presented annually to individuals who have demonstrated exceptional leadership, innovation, and impact within the realms of science and technology.
Dr.-Ing. E. h. Peter Leibinger is widely recognized as a trailblazer and has held several positions as managing director at various TRUMPF companies. He was Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of TRUMPF SE + Co. KG and has been the TRUMPF Supervisory Board Chairman since July. In 2020, Dr. Leibinger was also appointed as co-chair of an expert council to advise the German federal government on the development of quantum computers. These are just some of the remarkable achievements that show his commitment to innovation and how he has become a true leader of industry.
LIA’s Executive Director, Gilbert Haas said, “Peter Leibinger has advanced laser technology for decades. His innovative leadership, ardent support, and advocacy of lasers in science, politics and society contribute to the advancement of laser technology and applications worldwide.”
The award ceremony honoring Dr.-Ing. E. h. Peter Leibinger took place on Wednesday, October 18 at The Palmer House Hilton in Chicago, IL. During the ceremony, Dr. Leibinger delivered his address entitled “The Laser-TRUMPF Synergy”.
LIA extends its warmest congratulations to Dr.-Ing. E. h. Peter Leibinger on this well-deserved recognition.
About LIA:
The Laser Institute of America (LIA) is the professional society for laser applications and safety serving the industrial, educational, medical, research and government communities throughout the world since 1968.
The Laser Institute, a nonprofit organization that promotes laser safety and education, announced that Dr. Nathaniel Quick has retired from his Executive Director position, effective February 28, 2023. LIA’s President Henrikki Pantsar says, “The organization has been managed by Executive Director Dr. Nat Quick for the past five years, and it is due to his leadership and the tireless work of the LIA Staff that we are in this position to look for further growth. Therefore, it is with sadness that I announce the retirement of Nat from his position as the Executive Director. But it is also my pleasure to announce Nat’s retirement, as we know that it will allow him to enjoy other aspects of his life, enjoy time with his family and relax after spending a majority of his life in management and executive positions, as an entrepreneur, and most recently guiding our Laser Institute of America.”
Dr. Quick has been an integral part of LIA, bringing his expertise and vision to help the organization grow and achieve success. “We are extremely grateful for Nat’s service to the LIA and to his leadership filled with hard work, passion and integrity,” says Henrikki Pantsar.
While announcing his retirement, Dr. Quick had this to say, “I will miss being a part of the day-to-day operations of LIA and its staff, but look forward to providing support and advice when and where needed. It has been an honor and privilege to serve. I will forever be grateful for my time at LIA and the memories I have made there. Thank you to all who have supported me along this journey.”
The LIA would like to thank Dr. Quick for his hard work, dedication, and commitment to the organization and wishes him all the best in his retirement.
LIA has begun the search for a new executive director and is committed to finding the best candidate to lead the organization into its next chapter. If you know someone who would be interested in the position, the posting can be found at www.lia.org/ed-application
Held from October 22-26 in Atlanta, ICALEO® 2017 attendees will review state-of-the art updates in laser materials processing and predict where the future will lead
Held this year from October 22-26 at the Sheraton Atlanta Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia, the 36th edition of the conference continues its legacy as the leading source of technical information in the laser industry, dedicated to the field of laser materials processing. The conference allows researchers and end-users to meet and review the best in the business, while presenters at the conference will be given the opportunity to have their technical papers peer-reviewed.
The blind peer-review panel will focus on the quality, relevance, and significance of the research and findings. Selected papers will be recognized in the ICALEO 2017 Congress Proceedings and subsequently published in the Journal of Laser Applications (JLA).
Each year, ICALEO attracts more than 200 companies and organizations from more than 30 countries. With more than 20 vendors currently scheduled for this year’s conference, LIA’s unique Laser Industry Vendor Program allows vendors and attendees the opportunity to discuss the latest equipment and applications in a low-key setting after the technical sessions. With no conflicting session scheduled during this time slot, participants can commit their full attention to vendors.
ICALEO also offers sponsorship opportunities, acknowledging sponsors through onsite signage, visibility on the website, and inclusion in the distributed program. Attendees will have the opportunity to experience the most-current products and services from the leading industry exhibitors and sponsors, including those listed below:
Laser Microprocessing Co-Chair: Cather Simpson, University of Auckland
Nanomanufacturing Conference Chair: Yongfeng Lu, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
In keeping with tradition, the 2017 edition of ICALEO brings together academics and laser industry professionals and allows them a space to discuss the advancement of laser technology and encourage its successful reach into the future.
Today there exist a number of technologies for additive manufacturing of components.
The two most prominent types utilizing lasers for generating parts out of metals are either powder bed based solutions or direct energy deposition, often referred to as laser metal deposition. As a company Laserline focuses mainly on the second type. Depending on the application it allows you to produce larger part sizes with higher productivity (deposition rates and therefore higher productivity) due to the fact of not being limited by the size of the building chamber as it would be in the case of a powder bed machine. It is also much faster in many cases.
Laserline identified four main application areas for AM in which we operate and be described based on examples in this article. Those areas include, besides generating complete parts by terms of additive manufacturing, also repair welding application or hybrid machines – a combination of conventional machining and laser technology the fourth main application area would be providing functional areas on conventionally manufactured parts.
Additive manufacturing technology allows generating shapes and structures in a single production step with little material loss, post machining and tool wear (near-net-shape manufacturing). Thereby you can use material in powder or wire form. The advantage of using wire is that you will have a 100% material utilization; the compromise on the other hand might be the directional dependency when you supply the wire laterally and not coaxial. Pic. 1 shows an example of a free form application as a rocket nozzle demonstrator part made out of Inconel 625.
Pic.1 Free form powder AM of a rocket nozzle demonstrator (Source: Fraunhofer CLA)
The part was done without any type of process control. Another interesting example of AM with Titanium is shown in Pic.2.
Pic. 2 Ti64 powder AM with closed loop process control (Source: Fraunhofer CLA)
Compared to the rocket nozzle, process control was used when producing the demonstrator part in pic.2. The camera based system (in this case E-MAqS) is capable of measuring the size and temperature of the melt pool. Furthermore it can give feedback to the laser source and adjust the laser power accordingly to maintain the desired size of the melt pool. This in turn ensures consistent reproducible part build ups with no defects.
Another very interesting and promising approach is to integrate the laser source into machine tools. There are several hybrid machine tool concepts being developed; one of them is the combination of additive and subtractive tools which achieves a new level of manufacturing. One example is the merger of a laser with a 5-axis milling machine. The integrated diode laser deposits the powdered metal layer by layer, generating a solid, fully dense metal part. The following milling operations directly finish machines surfaces in areas necessary, without changing setup.
Pic.3 An example of a conventional milling machine with integrated AM technology (Source: DMG Mori-Seiki)
This flexible switch between laser and mill also allows the machining finish of areas, which would be impossible to reach on the final component. Designs with undercuts, internal geometries and overhangs without support structure are no problem. The manufacturing of completely new structures and designs are now possible. All weldable metals, which are available in powder form, can be used, for example steel, nickel and cobalt alloys as well as titanium, bronze or brass.
A third important field of AM from our perspective are repair welding applications. Probably the most prominent and widely industrially utilized are the repairs of turbine blades. Turbine blades in steam engines, especially in the first two rows, experience a lot of wear through erosion. Instead of replacing the whole part it is possible to repair the worn area by putting a couple of layers (mostly nickel / cobalt based super alloys) and machine them down to the finished surface, see Pic.4.
This remanufacturing procedure saves up to 90% of material and energy cost compared to manufacturing a new blade. Even though turbine blades are the most prominent example of laser repair welding a wide variety of other parts can be restored using the procedure, e.g. worm shafts, helical gears, molds, etc. to name a few. When speaking about additive manufacturing most people have the production of complete parts in mind. This doesn’t always have to be the case. Often it makes more sense from an economic standpoint to add to a conventionally (and relatively inexpensively) produced part functional areas where they are needed. Pic. 5 shows one such example.
In this case 100 lbs. of hard and wear resistant Stellite 21 powder material was deposited on a metal pipe base structure to form the extruder thread. One further example of it can be functional layers on drill bits where sensors need to be shielded from magnetic interference. By creating heat resistant layers out of non-magnetic materials it is possible to place those sensors.Through a clever combination of the usage of conventional and additive manufacturing technologies it is possible to produce advanced parts without increasing the cost.
A company known for its high-speed polygon scanners and expertise, Precision Laser Scanning, LLC was founded by George Helser in 2015. Helser has more than 25 years of experience in optics, including one patent, and 11 years of experience with high-speed polygon scanners.
Meet Precision Laser Scanning – LIA’s Featured Corporate Member for July 2017
Precision Laser Scanning is focused on high-speed laser scanning up to hundreds of meters per second. The company most notably provides polygon scanners and related optics. With today’s fastest Ultrafast / Ultra-Short-Pulse lasers, polygon scanners are the solution for reaching the full potential of the lasers. The company also manufactures advanced controllers and SOS detection systems. They import the highest-quality beam shapers, compact beam expanders, and F-Theta lenses from Germany and Japan to supply along with their polygon scanners.
Recently, the company introduced a unique IR detection glass (HI POWER – IR VIEWER), which is a virtual visualization tool useful to anyone who works with high-power 1064 nm beams. With a damage threshold of 100 W/mm2, it converts 900-1070 nm to green visible light. Since the glass contains imbedded nanocrystals, it is very durable and passes 80 percent of the beam. It can therefore be permanently installed in an operating system to verify operation, and it is superior to opaque laser-detection cards.
Recently, the company introduced a unique IR detection glass (HI POWER – IR VIEWER), which is a virtual visualization tool useful to anyone who works with high-power 1064 nm beams.
Located in Scottsdale, AZ, Precision Laser Scanning is comprised of five employees with more than 40 years of combined experience in laser scanning. Helser compares their business model to that of Apple in that they invent new technology, design products, and market them.
The most valuable service the company offers is the ability to educate customers on the implementation of high-speed polygon scanner technology to achieve up to hundreds of meters per second. Since polygon scanning operates much differently than traditional galvanometer scanning, customers benefit from the experience offered by the company and are therefore able to bring high-speed Polygon Scan Heads to market quickly.
Helser says the company as a whole is most proud of its worldwide reputation in the industry. As subject-matter experts in polygon scanner design and implementation, he truly believes their customers receive the most competent advice during the design, implementation, and production of their Polygon Scan Heads. Polygon scanners were originally developed for laser printers and copiers 40 years ago, but Precision Laser Scanning is re-inventing them for material processing and equipping customers with the knowledge to implement the improved technology.
Eagle Eye Polygon Scanner
Because of the company’s focus on high-speed laser scanning for material processing, Helser appreciates the focus that the Laser Institute of America (LIA) places on material processing as well. He notes that LIA excels at laser safety training and regularly brings together like-minded individuals at the conferences. As a member of LIA since 2012, Precision Laser Scanning has participated in every ICALEO conference held since joining. ICALEO is the leading international event to attend for learning about the latest research in the field and networking with experts from all over the world.
“Anyone interested in the latest advances in material processing will find it very worthwhile to attend the annual ICALEO conference,” Helser said. “As President of Precision Laser Scanning, ICALEO helps me to guide our customers doing material science and to position our company to provide solutions for the latest applications.”
