Abstract

When two similar small objects that are installed in the arms of a Mach–Zehnder interferometer are illuminated in such a way that the image of one object in the second beam splitter is located on the other object, the diffracted waves from the objects are exactly superimposed in the interference field. The superimposed diffraction patterns disappear for a phase difference equal to an odd multiple of π. The phase change induced by imposing changes on the medium surrounding one of the objects can be determined very accurately only by measuring the intensity distribution that appears on the superimposed diffraction patterns. Using this technique we have determined the temperature profile around a wire of diameter $0.26\mathrm{mm}$ carrying different electric currents by evaluating the phase changes at 700 points on the superimposed diffraction patterns to the accuracy of $\pi /200$. This technique allows us to eliminate the effect of light diffraction from the geometry of an object, to measure the amplitudes of the interfering diffracted waves accurately, and to evaluate the phase difference of the diffracting waves reliably.

© 2010 Optical Society of America

Measurement of natural convective heat transfer coefficient along the surface of a heated wire using digital holographic interferometry

Varun Kumar, Manoj Kumar, and Chandra Shakher
Appl. Opt. 53(27) G74-G83 (2014)

Electronic speckle pattern interferometry and digital holographic interferometry with microbolometer arrays at 10.6 μm

Jean-François Vandenrijt and Marc P. Georges
Appl. Opt. 49(27) 5067-5075 (2010)

Development of microperiodic mirrors for hard x-ray phase-contrast imaging

Dan Stutman, Michael Finkenthal, and Nicolae Moldovan
Appl. Opt. 49(25) 4677-4686 (2010)

Wavefront measurements of phase plates combining a point-diffraction interferometer and a Hartmann-Shack sensor

Juan M. Bueno, Eva Acosta, Christina Schwarz, and Pablo Artal
Appl. Opt. 49(3) 450-456 (2010)

Application of the windowed-Fourier-transform-based fringe analysis technique for investigating temperature and concentration fields in fluids

Sharika Mohanan and Atul Srivastava
Appl. Opt. 53(11) 2331-2344 (2014)