Optical combiner for combining multiple laser beams in a flow cytometer

An optical combiner for combining laser beams in a flow cytometer that illuminates particles in a fluid stream comprising:

• a first laser beam having a first frequency, a first beam size and a first divergence;
• a second laser beam having a second frequency, which is different from said first frequency, a second beam size, which is different from said first beam size, and a second divergence;
• a beam adjuster comprising a negative focal length lens and a positive focal length lens that adjusts said second beam size and said second divergence of said second laser beam to form a substantially collimated second laser beam;
• an optical beam combiner that substantially concentrically combines said first laser beam and said second laser beam to form a substantially concentric collimated beam;
• focusable beam shaping optics aligned with said substantially concentric collimated beam, having a first cylindrical lens oriented in a substantially vertical lens axis direction and a second cylindrical lens oriented in a substantially horizontal lens axis direction, said second cylindrical lens disposed to focus said first laser beam and said second substantially collimated laser beam in a vertical direction on a flow stream of said flow cytometer, said first cylindrical lens adjustably disposed to focus said first laser beam and said substantially collimated second laser beam in a horizontal direction so that said substantially collimated second laser beam forms a second elliptically shaped focal point on said fluid stream that is substantially aligned with a first elliptically shaped focal point formed by said first laser beam on said fluid stream.

An optical combiner for combining laser beams in a flow cytometer that illuminates particles in a fluid stream comprising:

• a first laser beam having a first frequency, a first beam size and a first divergence;
• a second laser beam having a second frequency, which is different from said first frequency, a second beam size, which is different from said first beam size, and a second divergence;
• an optical beam combiner that substantially concentrically combines said first laser beam and said second laser beam to form a substantially concentric combined beam;
• focusable beam shaping optics aligned with said substantially concentric combined beam, having a first cylindrical lens oriented in a substantially vertical lens axis direction and a second cylindrical lens oriented in a substantially horizontal lens axis direction, said second cylindrical lens focusing said first laser beam and said second laser beam in a substantially vertical direction, said first cylindrical lens focusing said first laser beam and said second laser beam in a substantially horizontal direction;
• a beam adjuster aligned with said second laser beam upstream from said focusable beam shaping optics, that adjusts said second beam size and said second divergence of said second laser beam using a negative focal length lens in combination with a positive focal length lens so that said focusable beam shaping optics focus both said first laser beam and said second laser beam in an elliptically shaped focal point on said fluid stream.