Abstract

A simple phase shifting lateral shearing interferometer based on a thick birefringent plate is proposed. The interferometer is composed of a thick birefringent plate and a polarizer. The thick birefringent plate works as the shear generator as well as the phase shifter. The optical path difference and shearing amount between the two sub-beams emerging from the thick birefringent plate change depending on the incident angle. For incident angles in a certain range, the shearing amount stays almost constant while the optical path difference varies linearly. Thus phase shifting can be obtained by rotating the thick birefringent plate. It is a very simple structure for the testing of a small beam, and equidistant phase shifting can be obtained by equal incident angle variation. The validity of the interferometer is verified by both simulation and experiment.

© 2017 Optical Society of America

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