HOLOGRAM RECORDING WITH MUTUALLY ORTHOGONAL POLARIZED WAVES IN SR0.61BA0.39NB2O6-CE

Sr0.61Ba0.39Nb2O6:Ce exhibits pronounced dichroism which is strongly c orrelated with the cerium concentration. This property triggers effect ive hologram recording with mutually orthogonal polarized writing beam s via self-diffraction. We measure the saturation diffraction efficien cy, using an extraordinarily polarized readout beam, versus the polari zation of the recording beams. The experimental results are compared t o straightforward theoretical models based on linear dichroism includi ng self-diffraction. We show that the saturation diffraction efficienc y is strongly enhanced by self-diffraction effects.