Polarization Effect in Phase Holograms.

Abstract

Birefringence is an inherent optical property of anisotropic materials that enables manipulation of polarization state of light beams for various photonic and optoelectronic applications. In this work, we demonstrate the ability of the cellophane sheet to act as a phase retarder. Results show that the cellophane introduces a phase shift of 0.98π radians on the incident beam. By rotating the cellophane sheet on the object beam, the fringe separation is measured for different angles and the values used to calculate the ordinary and extraordinary refractive indices as 1.4721 ± 0.0002 and 1.4680 ± 0.0002 respectively. Because of its sufficient birefringence and small thickness of 24 µm, cellophane can be used to fabricate special polarization pupil masks by cutting and aligning different cellophane structures appropriately.