We demonstrate calibration and operation of a single wavelength (660 nm) Mueller matrix ellipsometer in normal transmission configuration using dual continuously rotating anisotropic mirrors. The mirrors contain highly spatially coherent nanostructure slanted columnar titanium thin films deposited onto optically thick gold layers on glass substrates. Upon rotation around the mirror normal axis, sufficient modulation of the Stokes parameters of light reflected at oblique angle of incidence is achieved. Thereby, the mirrors can be used as a polarization state generator and polarization state analyzer in a generalized ellipsometry instrument. A Fourier expansion approach is found sufficient to render and calibrate the effects of the mirror rotations onto the polarized light train within the ellipsometer. The Mueller matrix elements of a set of anisotropic samples consisting of a linear polarizer and a linear retarder are measured and compared with model data, and very good agreement is observed.
This content will become publicly available on March 25, 2025
Dielectric mirrors comprising thin‐film multilayers are widely used in optical experiments because they can achieve substantially higher reflectance compared to metal mirrors. Here, potential problems are investigated that can arise when dielectric mirrors are used at oblique incidence, in particular for focused beams. It is found that light beams reflected from dielectric mirrors can experience lateral beam shifts, beam‐shape distortion, and depolarization, and these effects have a strong dependence on wavelength, incident angle, and incident polarization. Because vendors of dielectric mirrors typically do not share the particular layer structure of their products, several dielectric‐mirror stacks are designed and simulated, and then the lateral beam shift from two commercial dielectric mirrors and one coated metal mirror is also measured. This paper brings awareness of the tradeoffs between dielectric mirrors and front‐surface metal mirrors in certain optics experiments, and it is suggested that vendors of dielectric mirrors provide information about beam shifts, distortion, and depolarization when their products are used at oblique incidence.
more » « less- PAR ID:
- 10505456
- Publisher / Repository:
- Wiley
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Annalen der Physik
- ISSN:
- 0003-3804
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
more » « less
-
High intensity, laser solid interactions are capable of generating attosecond light bursts via high harmonic generation, most work focuses on single beam interactions. In this study, we perform a numerical investigation on the role of wavelength and polarization in relativistic, high harmonic generation from normal-incidence, two-beam interactions off plasma mirrors. We find that the two-beam harmonic generation mechanism is a robust process described by a set of well-defined selection rules. We demonstrate that the emitted harmonics from normal incidence interactions exhibit an intensity optimization when the incident fields are of equal intensity for two-color circularly-polarized fields.more » « less
-
more » « less
Two-color laser beams are instrumental in light-field control and enhancement of high-order harmonic, spectral supercontinuum, and terahertz radiation generated in gases, plasmas, and solids. We demonstrate a multi-terawatt two-color beam produced using a relativistic plasma mirror, with 110 mJ at 800 nm and 30 mJ at 400 nm. Both color components have high spatial quality and can be simultaneously focused, provided that the plasma mirror lies within a Rayleigh range of the driving fundamental beam. Favorable scaling of second-harmonic generation by plasma mirrors at relativistic intensities suggests them as an excellent tool for multi-color waveform synthesis beyond the petawatt level.
-
more » « less
We theoretically study the spectral characteristics and noise performance of wavelength-interrogated fiber-optic sensors based on an extrinsic Fabry–Perot (FP) interferometer (EFPI) formed by thin metal mirrors. We develop a model and use it to analyze the effect of key sensor parameters on the visibility and spectral width of the sensors, including the beam width of the incident light, metal coating film thickness, FP cavity length, and wedge angle of the two mirrors. Through Monte Carlo simulations, we obtain an empirical equation that can be used to estimate the wavelength resolution from the visibility and spectral width, which can be used as a figure-of-merit that is inherent to the sensor and independent on the system noises. The work provides a useful tool for designing, constructing, and interrogating high-resolution fiber-optic EFPI sensors.
-
more » « less
Abstract Recently, reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs) have attracted extensive attentions from the communication community due to their powerful wavefront manipulation and signal modulation abilities. Optically transparent RISs are needed in some scenarios requiring both optical transparency and high‐quality communication services. In RIS‐based wireless communications, the channel reciprocity is an important factor to be considered since the electromagnetic responses of RISs usually depend on the incident and receiving angles. To address this problem, an optically transparent 2‐bit RIS with low angular sensitivity is proposed. By applying a transparent dielectric substrate and metal‐mesh‐based patterns, the designed RIS achieves a light transmittance of 49.3%. Both the simulation and measurement results demonstrate the low angular sensitivity at transverse magnetic incidence from 0° to 60°. Moreover, beam steering experiments under various coding sequences and various incident angles are simulated and measured, and the results are consistent with the theoretically predicted results. A further study on the broadcast mode of the RIS shows that its phase response is weakly dependent to the incident and receiving directions.
