DESIGN, FABRICATION, AND CHARACTERIZATION OF FARM-BIREFRINGENT MULTILAYER POLARIZING BEAM SPLITTER

Polarizing beam splitters that use the anisotropic spectral reflectivi ty (ASR) characteristic of high-spatial-frequency multilayer binary gr atings have been designed, fabricated, and characterized. Using the AS R effect with rigorous coupled-wave analysis, we design an optical ele ment that is transparent for TM polarization and reflective for TE pol arization at an arbitrary incidence angle and operational wavelength. The experiments with the fabricated element demonstrate a high efficie ncy (>97%), with polarization extinction ratios higher than 220:1 at a wavelength of 1.523 mu m over a 20 degrees angular bandwidth by means of the ASR characteristics of the device. These ASR devices combine m any useful characteristics, such as compactness, low insertion loss, h igh efficiency, and broad angular and spectral bandwidth operations. ( C) 1997 Optical Society of America.