Abstract

The working principle of an optical isolator made of two corrugated dielectric gratings is introduced. One grating acts as a polarizer, and the other acts as a quarter-wave plate used in conical incidence converting linearly polarized light into circularly polarized light. Global maxima of diffraction efficiency for surface-corrugated gratings with binary, sinusoidal, and pyramidal ridge shapes with dependence on the material index are identified. Regarding technological feasibility for use in the visible wavelength range, high-frequency gratings with a binary shape were realized. With these gratings, an extinction ratio of more than 40 dB for the polarizer is theoretically possible, and more than 20 dB was experimentally achieved. A good correlation between theoretically calculated efficiencies and birefringences based on rigorous methods and the experimental results is demonstrated.

© 2002 Optical Society of America

Polarization-selective beam splitter based on a highly efficient simple binary diffraction grating

Danaë Delbeke, Roel Baets, and Peter Muys
Appl. Opt. 43(33) 6157-6165 (2004)

Dielectric surface-relief gratings with high diffraction efficiency

Kiyoshi Yokomori
Appl. Opt. 23(14) 2303-2310 (1984)

Homogeneous layer models for high-spatial-frequency dielectric surface-relief gratings: conical diffraction and antireflection designs

David L. Brundrett, Elias N. Glytsis, and Thomas K. Gaylord
Appl. Opt. 33(13) 2695-2706 (1994)

Volume index gratings in the intermediate and form-birefringence regimes

Cécile Joubert, Vincent Laude, Mane-Si Laure Lee, and Juliette Plouin
Appl. Opt. 41(32) 6751-6762 (2002)

High-efficiency blazed diffractive optical elements for the violet wavelength fabricated by electron-beam lithography

Teruhiro Shiono, Tetsuya Hamamoto, and Koji Takahara
Appl. Opt. 41(13) 2390-2393 (2002)