Kenley, UK, April 10, 2003. Optical Surfaces Ltd. has announced that it is a key component supplier to Scientific Solutions Inc. for their NIR High Resolution Liquid Crystal Fabry-Perot Etalon (HR-LCFP), a tunable optical filter optimized for use in the near infrared.

Using proprietary manufacturing techniques in a thermally stable production environment has enabled Optical Surfaces to routinely supply batches of fused silica etalon pairs with industry leading accuracy to Scientific Solutions Inc. The demanding specifications required of the etalon pairs, to deliver the high performance of the HR-LCFP, was better than lambda/200 matching accuracy and surface roughness of less than 10 Angstroms.

The HR-LCFP provides a solid-state, tunable interferometer whose plate parallelism is fixed at the time of manufacture, yet maintains tunability over several orders of interference with a narrow band-pass and arbitrary resonant gap size. The device utilizes a thin liquid-crystal cell in its resonant cavity formed by the highly polished etalon substrates. The refractive index between the substrates is altered by varying an electric field across the liquid crystal. The novel technology incorporated in the HR-LCFP allows rapid, precise and highly stable spectral selection. Because the HR-LCFP is frequency agile, it enables nearly simultaneous measurement of multiple wavelengths in the NIR region.

Current applications for the HR-LCFP include laser tuning, lidar and narrowband spectral imaging. Future use is anticipated in spectroscopic, telecommunications and space-borne sensing applications.

From its ISO 9001 approved production facility Optical Surfaces Ltd. is able to deliver pairs of precisely matched etalons up to 150 mm (6 inch) diameter with matching accuracy to lambda/300 with ring or optically contacted spacers.

For more information, visit: www.optisurf.com

Optical Manufacturing