A phase-shifting vectorial-shearing interferometer with wedge plate phase-shifter

We present a novel phase-shifting vectorial-shearing interferometer with a wedge plate phase-shifter. The interferometer is based on a modified Mach-Zehnder configuration; the common-path nature makes it capable of testing the wavefront of a short coherence-length light source, such as a laser diode. Vectorial shear (shearing in the x and y directions simultaneously) in an arbitrary direction is introduced by inserting two wedge plates orthogonally in two arms, respectively. One of the wedge plates is split into two parts (parallel part and wedge part); phase shift is produced by moving the wedge part in contact along the parallel part. The moving distance for a 2 pi phase shift is a few millimetres in specific conditions. The wedge plate phase-shifter increases the moving distance for phase shift and makes the control of phase shift relatively easy. We also discuss the lateral shear error and phase shift errors induced by wedge plates. The lateral shear error is small enough to be ignored; the phase shift error is determined mainly by the wedge angle error. Lastly, we give the experimental results of phase-shifting interference fringes in vectorial shear mode.

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