This highly illustrated book presents the essential information and major constituents of laser welding, including laser brazing and laser-arc hybrid welding. Students, engineers, researchers, scientists, specialists, professors, consultants, designers, and executives worldwide will fully grasp the fundamentals, the present state, and the applications of laser welding. Welding phenomena, formation mechanisms and preventive procedures of welding defects, and process monitoring and adaptive control are especially emphasized, because understanding these aspects of laser welding greatly improves the performance of work and research and solves many problems in the field. Finally, the book shows how increasingly widespread use of a variety of materials is bringing major advances to laser