*If you have ever gone to your Department Head with a neat, new project, you have probably run up against the scarcity of available laboratory space that is typical in most facilities. When combined with the cost of outfitting a new lab this may have caused you to put that neat, new experiment aside rather than face the daunting task of creating the additional infrastructure needed to expand your work. What is the cost?

Consider the following. A 4-ft X 8-ft optical table (a representative area of 32 sq. ft on which you can perform that neat, new experiment) requires a room with dimensions of about 12-ft X 16-ft (192 sq. ft. including cabinets, plumbing, electrical, etc.) to support it. Typical construction cost for that laboratory space is $400/sq. ft¹. Thus, $400/sq.ft X 192 sq.ft = $76,800.00 is the total cost just for the laboratory space needed to support 32 sq. ft. of table space on which you can work.

$76,800.00 divided by 32 = $2,400.00 is the value of each sq. ft. of optical table space just associated with the cost of the infrastructure (room + utilities) that supports the laboratory.

Now add in the cost of the optical table, the ultrafast laser system that sits on the optical table plus all the additional instrumentation that you need to perform your experiments and your lab now has about $450,000.00 worth of equipment in it.

$450,000.00 divided by 32 = $14,062.00 which represents the additional cost per sq. ft. of table space on which you actually perform your experiments.

Adding these two together ($14,062.00 + $2,400.00) = $16,462.00/sq. ft. is the cost of the space on your optical table available to you for experiments.

What is the point of this exercise? Some commercial Regenerative Amplifier systems occupy the full 4-ft X 8-ft optical table space - at an infrastructure cost to you of $16,462.00 X 32 = $526,800.00!

If, instead your Regenerative Amplifier occupied only 6 sq. ft. then you would be making available $526,800.00 - $16,462.00 X 6 = $428,028.00 worth of table space on which you can perform additional experiments (not to mention the additional associated publications on which you can base additional funding proposals.)

Our CPA-Series of Ti:Sapphire Regenerative Amplifiers occupy only 6 sq. ft. of table space, leaving you with 28 sq. ft. of additional space on which to perform your experiments - saving you over $428,000.00 in valuable table space on which you can perform your experiments.²

¹http://www.rdmag.com/ShowPR.aspx?PUBCODE=014&ACCT=
1400000100&ISSUE=0405&RELTYPE=PR&ORIGRELTYPE=FE&PRODCODE=
00000000&PRODLETT=B&CommonCount=0
²Note: This calculation does not include the space occupied by the OPA’s shown in the above schematic, which, if you need them, will occupy the same amount of table space regardless of which commercial regenerative amplifier you buy.