Waveplate

Product Description

Waveplates (retardation plates or phase shifters) are made from materials which exhibit birefringence. The velocities of the extraordinary and ordinary rays through the birefringent material vary inversely with their refractive indices. This difference in velocities gives rise to a phase difference when the two beams recombine. In the case of an incident linearly polarized beam this is given by α=2πd(ne-no)/λ, where is α phase difference; d is thickness of waveplate; ne, no are refractive indices of extraordinary and ordinary rays respectively; λ is wavelength. At any specific wavelength the phase difference is governed by the thickness of the retarder.

Our waveplates, including octadic-wave (λ/8), quarter-wave (λ/4), half-wave (λ/2) and full-wave (λ) plates, are widely used in synthesis and analysis of light in various states of polarization. The wavelengths within the range of 240nm~2100nm are all available.

Capability

ATTRIBUTE COMMERCIAL HIGH PRECISION
Material Crystal Quartz, MgF2 Crystal Quartz, MgF2
Dimension TOLERANCE +0, -0.13mm ±0.02mm
Wavefront Distortion λ/8@632.8nm λ/20@632.8nm
Retardation Tolerance@23°C λ/150@632.8nm λ/500@632.8nm
Wavelength Range 240~1200nm 240~1200nm
Parallelism 3 arc seconds 0.5 arc seconds
Surface Quality 20-10 scratch and dig 10-5 scratch and dig
AR/AR Coating R<0.2% at central wavelength R<0.1% at central wavelength