Time domain synthesis of electro-optical birefringent system for optical waveform generation

In this paper is described a novel technique for producing an electro-optical intensity synthesizer which can generate different periodic time domain waveforms through only sine or cosine wave applied-voltages. The synthesizer presented here consists of a series of stages between two polarizers, with each stage consisting of an electro-optic element and a compensator. Every electro-optical element has the same applied-voltage function but different azimuth angles and ratios between the longitudinal and transverse lengths. The main principle is the synthesis of an electro-optic effect and a polarization interference effect in the time domain. This technique is based on an expanded Fourier positive-direction searching algorithm, which can not only simplify the calculation process but also produces many choices of structural parameters for different waveforms generation. A three-stage synthesis of an electro-optical birefringent system for continuous square waveform is undertaken to prove the principle.