A Method for Simultaneously Measuring Phase Retardation and Fast Axis of Any Wave Plate

Author

Wang, Wei ; Zhu, Hong ; Liang, Zhiqiang

Author_Institution

Dept. of Math. & Phys., Shandong Jiao Tong Univ. Jinan, Jinan, China

fYear

2011

fDate

16-18 May 2011

Firstpage

1

Lastpage

4

Abstract

A method for simultaneously measuring phase retardation and fast axis of any wave plate is presented. In this method, a test wave plate is placed between a polarizer and an analyzer, and with no requirements for the initial position of the wave plate. The test wave plate can rotate under the control of a stepping motor. With the rotation of the wave plate, a photoelectric detector is used to detect the output light intensity, and the time-dependent curve of the output intensity can be obtained. Based on the analysis of the curve, the phase retardation and fast axis of the wave plate can be determined at the same time. The advantage of this method is its simplicity, low cost, better accuracy and it can effectively eliminate artificial operation error because of the measuring process is controlled by a computer.

Keywords

optical polarisers; optical retarders; optical variables measurement; photoelectric devices; stepping motors; analyzer; fast axis; phase retardation; photoelectric detector; polarizer; stepping motor; wave plate; Biomedical measurements; Optical polarization; Optical retarders; Optical variables measurement; Optimized production technology; Phase measurement; Velocity measurement;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photonics and Optoelectronics (SOPO), 2011 Symposium on

Conference_Location

Wuhan

ISSN

2156-8464

Print_ISBN

978-1-4244-6555-2

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/SOPO.2011.5780575

Filename

5780575