Welcome @amylynn. Good questions and it sounds like you have some experience in design and making. There are many, many topics on the forum that have picked over everything very well. Use that search magnifying glass. It’s a magic carpet. Go over to the Glowforge Question of the Day and answer them to introduce yourself.
Another thing if you have not used a Discourse powered forum before, you might want to head on over to www.discourse.org to learn a few tricks.
Then head to this thread to find links to in depth explorations on the Internet for all relevant laser stuff.