DEPOLARIZATION EFFECT IN A RESONATOR WITH CORNER-CUBE REFLECTORS

When an optical beam is incident into corner-cube reflector, it makes a large incidence angle with all three reflecting surfaces, and the po larization of the retroreflected beam depends greatly on the property of the reflecting surfaces. Knowledge of the polarization change is pa rticularly important for a laser system with a polarization-dependent gain, such as a free-electron laser. By following the beam path in a c orner cube reflector, one can study the depolarization effect by using 2 x 2 matrices. The results show that the change of polarization stat es is fairly sensitive to the phase difference between the s-wave and p-wave reflectivities of the surfaces. This sensitivity is greatly red uced if the two corner cubes in the resonator are oriented in the same direction. (C) 1996 Optical Society of America