2

IEEE TRANSACTIONS

ON SONICS AND

ULTRASONICS, su-23, VOL.

NO.

1,

JANUARY

1976

1. Acoustooptic Devices and Applications

Abstruct-The theory, technology, and applications of bulk-wave acoustooptic devices are reviewed. A coupled wave analysis for the acoustooptic interaction in an anisotropic medium is presented. The bandwidth and angular aperture characteristics of acoustooptic devices are discussed i terms of simple phase mismatch consideran tions. The present status of acoustooptic materials and transducer technology is summarized. The characteristics and applications of acoustooptic devices, including deflectors, modulators, and optical filters, are discussed.

I. INTRODUCTION
H E N AN acoustic wave propagat'es in a transparent material, it produces a periodic modulation of the indthx of refract,ioE via the elastooptical effect. This provides a moving phasc grating which may diffract portions of an incident light beam into or more directions. This one phcnomenon, known as acoustooptic diffraction, has led to various optical devices, including deflectors, modulators, filters, etc. The basic theory of acoustooptic interaction in isot'ropic media was well understood before the advent of the laser. Discussion of early theoretical work can be found in Born Z=L and Wolf [l] and in a review paper by Quate et al. [ 2 ] . z=o It was laserdevelopment that stimulated extensive reFig. 1. Geometry of acoustoopticinteraction. search on t,hedeviceapplications of acoustoopticinteractions.Theoryandtechniques of acoustooptic devices of were developed for the purpose of modulating and deflect- optic materials is summarized. Section IV is a review ing laserbeams. By 1967 severalimportantresults on transducer technology. I n Section V we describe, in some detail,three basic devices: deflectors, modulators, and acoustooptic devices had been reported. These include the works of Gordon [ 3 ] on the efficiency and bandwidth filters. Several areas of application arereviewed in Section of acoustooptic deflectorsand modulators, by Iiorpelet d. VI, and we briefly discuss the future outlook for acousto[ ] onacousticbeamsteering,andby 4 Dixon [ G ] on optic devices in Section VII. acoustooptic interaction in anisotropic media. Since then there has been a rapid progress of acoustooptic devices, 11. THEORY OF ACOUSTOOPTIC INTERACTIONS due primarily t o the development of superior acoustooptic materials and efficient broadband transducers. Various Coupled Wave Equations acoustooptic devices have evolved with many applications The basicgeometry of a n acoustooptic interaction is in diverse fields. defined in Fig. 1. The z-axis is chosen perpendicular to the In thispaper we shall review the principles and practice boundary of the medium. An acoustic wave is propagating of bulk wave acoustooptic devices. In thesection to follow, in the z plane and making an z angle ea from the z-axis. An we shall present a coupled wave analysis of the acousto- optical beam is incident in the same plane with an angle opticinteractionin an anisot>ropicmedium and discuss eo from the z-axis.' Under certain conditions, diffraction thebandwidthandangularaperturecharacteristics of of the incident optical beam into one or more diffraction acoustooptic devices, using simple phase mismatch con- orders may occur. siderations. I n Section 111, the present status of acoustoAcoustooptic diffraction can be viewed as a parametric

interaction [6]. Via the elastoopticeffect,

Manuscript received July 18, 1975. The author is wit.h t,heApplied Technology Division, Itek Corporation, Sunnyvale, CA 94086. Angles are measured inside the medium.

the incident

CHANQ: ACOUSMOPTIC INTERACTIONS, I

optical wave mixes with the acoustic wave to generate a number of polarizationwaves at the combination f r e quencies. The polarizationwaves in turn will generate optical radiation a t these new frequencies. Let the angular frequency and wave vector of the incident optical wave be denoted by W O and ko, respectively, and those of the acoustic wave by W , and k,. The polarization waves then consist of waves with angular frequencies W, = WO and wave vectors K,,, = ko mk,,where m = f l , f 2 , Thus the total electric field of the incident and diffracted optical waves can be expanded in plane wavesas

+ m. u ,
S .

equations (4) inordertodeterminethe efficiency and bandwidth of acoustooptic devices. We must first relate the acoustooptic tensor X in our formulation to the more familiar elastooptic coefficients. Traditionally, the subject of the elastooptic effect is based on Pockels phenomenological theory [S] which states that the change of the inverse dielectric tensor A B i , caused by the acoustic wave is proportional to the acoustic strain Skl
ABij =

C PijklSkl

(71

OD

E(r,t)

3 C&.E,(zj
--m

expj(w,t - KR1-y)

where the p i j k l are the elmtoopticalcoefficients. From ( 2 ) and (7) it can be shown

C.C.

(1)

Xijkl

-ni*n?pijkl.

(8)

The elastooptical coefficientsP i j k l are generally assumed to be symmetrical with respect to indices i and kl and can j be contracted to prs(r,s = 1,. - 6 ) . Nelson and Lax [S] have shown this is, in general, not necessarily true. They pointed out that the Pockels formulation is incomplete and that rotationeffects, arising from shear waves, should P ( r , t ) = c&.S(r,t)E(r,t) ( 2 ) be also included in strongly birefringent media. I n place use thedisplacement where X is a nonlinear susceptabilitytensor describing the of the acoustic strain,onemust gradient fts the more basic variables. elastooptic effect. S(r,tj is the strain the acoustic wave. of We further assume that acoustic strain takes the simple Another modification of the theory of elastooptic effect the is to include an indirect contribution due to electrooptic plane wave form, effect in a piezoelectric crystal [IO]. In most materials, S ( r , t ) = ${RSexpj(o,t - k , - r ) c.c.] (3) the piezoelectric effect is small, and the indirect contribuneglected. In LiNbOs,however,thereare where 5 is a unit strain tensorfor the acoustic wave and S tionmaybe significant contributions to the effective elastooptic coeffiis assumed to be independent of r . Substituting (1)-(3) cients [lo]. I n view of these modifications, one must be into Maxwells equation and neglecting second order very careful when he applies the conventional formulation terms, we obtain a set of differential equations, [ 7 ] in the study of acoustooptics. where gmis a unit vector in the directionthe electric field of of the mth wave and C.C. the complex conjugate. is We choose a phenomenologicalapproachandassume that the acoustically-induced polarization is proportional to the product of electric field and the acoustic strain,

Isotropic Diffruction
We shall refer to theacoustooptic diffraction as isotropic when either the medium isotropicor the process does not is change the polarization of the light beam. This caseis Km2 - ( w o / c ) particularly simple since the refractive indices of incident Ak, = 2k&, and diffracted light are about equal.2 The wavevectors all lie approximately on one circle. Fig. 2 shows the waveka vector constructions for isotropic diffractions. Note t,hat 2772 - cos (e, &) m2k0 the momentum mismatch Ak is constrained to be normal where n, is t,he index refraction for the mth wave. Physi- to the boundaryof the medium. of For isotropic diffraction, n, = no, the momentum miscally Ak, is the magnitude of the momentum mismatch between the polarizationwave andthe freewaves of match given by (5) reduces to (0, is taken to be equal to 90) medium, i.e., where X , = e^,. X and cm = cos BC Ak, is approximately given by [ 7 ]

+ wz(k,/ka) cos e,

+ +

Ak,,, = Km - k,,, = ka

+ mk, - k,,,

(6)

Akm =

rXam

where k,is the wavevector the free waveof the medium. of The magnitude of kmis equal to (wm/c)n,,,. Equation (4) is the coupled wave equation describing the interaction of optical and acoustic waves in an anisotropic medium, which when solved gives the electric field where n is the refractive index, X0 is the free-space optical of the optical waves in various diffraction orders. For an wavelength, and A is the acoustic wavelength. isotropic medium, it reduces to the familiar Raman-Nath equations [l]. * The small change of refractive indexof an extroaordinary ray due Later we shall seek the solution of the coupled wave to the smaU di5raction angle neglected. is

21~, eo COS

nA2 cos Bo

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SONICS

AND ULTRASONICS, JANUARY

1976

I n (14) we have used the relation P, = 4pV3 1 S I2LH, where P, is the acoustic power, p is the mass density, V is the acousticwavevelocity, and H is the height of the acoustic beam. Since 9 is usually small compared to ( A k ~ L / 2 ) 2in, significant error is introduced if IIin (13) is approximated by

Il = I l p sin?

)(; A :

(15)

where sinc ( x )

sin

(TL)/

( ? ~ x ) and ,

I l p = sin2 $l2

(16)

is the peak intensity of the diffracted light beam under exact momentum matching condition (Akl = 0). To analyze the acoustic frequency response of the diffracted light intensity, we introduce a phase mismatch3
6 ,
= -

AkmL 2a

Fig. 2.

Wavevectorconstruction for isotropicdiffractions:

To obtain exact momentum matching for light into the first order requires that Akl = 0, which occurs when the angle eo of the incident beam is equal to the Bragg angle BB, be defined by sin OB
=

The frequency dependence of 6, can be rea,dily derived from ( 9 ) . It is convenient to normalize acoustic frequencies to a center frequency fo of wavelength 120, where the Bragg condition is satisfied. I n terms of the normalized frequency, F = f/fo, the phase mismatch 6, is given by 6 ,
=

2nho2 Bo cos

sin 6'0 mF

2nh

-.

X0

I,
~

2O L

where L o is a characteristic lengt'h I n general, multiple diffractiono higher orders mayoccur. t If the interaction length L is sufficiently large, however, light. intensity in the high diffraction orders becomes negligibly small due to thelarge value of Ak,L. In the limit, only two modes, the zeroth and the first order,need to be At the center frequency (F = 1 ) where the Bragg condition is satisfied, the phase mismatch for the second order considered. In this case (4)reduces t o is equal to L j L O , and the int,ensity of the second order diffracted light builds up as sinc2 ( L / L 0 ) which becomes vanishing small as L > iTJ0. Thus Lo is approximately the > minimum interaction length to insure that the diffraction occurs in theHragg regime. In theopposite case knownas the Raman-Nath regime, L < JJ3, many diffraction orders < may occur since 6, remainssmall for many orders. By where p is the effective elastooptic coefficient for the particular mode of acoustooptic interaction. The diffraction numerically solving the coupled wave e q u a h n s , Klein is said to be in the Bragg regime when the two-mode and Cook [l21 studicd in detail the distinction betwcenthe approximation holds.The question of validity of the Bragg Bragg, Raman-Nath, and intermediate regimes. An approximate formula for tho 3-dB bandwidth of the limit approximation will be discussed later. diffracted light intensity is obtained from (15). 1 M 0.5 1 Equations (11) and (12) admit simple analytic soluwhen F1 m 0.45 and thr bandwidth is given by tions. At z = L , the normalized intensity for the first order diffraction [11] is

I = 1
where

sin2 ( V
t t

+ (AhL/212

+ (A k l L / 2 ) 2 )

(13) One may attempt to increase the bandwidt,h by choosing a smaller value of L / L 0 . However, in doing so the assumpJ

Normalized relative to 2 r .

CHANG: ACOUSTUOPTIC INTERACTIONS, I

't

yt

waves are different. The bandwidt,h characteristics of the interaction become significantly modified as a result of the birefringence.Fig. 3(a) shows the momentumdiagram for the birefringent diffraction in a uniaxial crystal when the optical wave vectors are normal to the optic axis. For : given acoustic wave direction, there exists two distinct L acoustic frequencies that satisfy exact momentum n-ratching conditions. The general case has two limiting cases as shown in Fig. 3(b) and 3 ( c ) , respectively. I'ig. 3 (b) cormsponds to thc case of a collinear interaction of optical waves and acousticwaves. Nobice that the momentum matching condition can be approximately satisfied for a givenacousticfrequencyovera wide range of incident light directions. This feature (i.e., large angular aperture characteristics) is of signiffcant importance t o tjhe operation of acoustoopt,ic filters [14]. In the other limiting case (Fig. 3 (c) ) , when the two solutions of momentum matching become degenerate, the diffracted light wave vector is perpendicular the to acoustic wave, andthemomentummatching condition can be approximately sat,isfied for a given incident light direction over a broad range of acoustic frequencies [S], [l.?]. The bandpass characteristics of the birefringent diffraction process can be determined from the phnsc mismatch function. From (.5) we have

(20)
Let

be the acoustic frequency a t which the degeneracy occurs, and choose fd to he equal to the center frequency In terms of the normalized frequency F = f!/.fo,(20) reduces to (for e,, = 90")

so.

Fig. 3. Wavevectorconstruction for birefringent diffractions.(a) General case of birefringent diffraction.(b) Collinear acoustooptic interaction. (c) 90" birefringent phase mat.ched diffraction.

tion that diffraction occurs in the Uragg regime may b e come invalid. The intensity of the diffracted light in the second ordercan becomeappreciablecompared to the firstorder,particularly at the low-frequency end [13]. From (1'7) it is seen that the phasemismatchfor the second-order diffraction 82 approaches zero as F is near 0.5. The interactionbandwidthisthuslimitedto one octave or less.

where

L O

is given by (18) with n

= 11".

When

Birefringent Diffraction
Dison [S] has pointed out that acoustooptic diffraction becomes significantly different from normal diffraction when it takes placebetween a n ordinary wave and a n extraordinary wave in a n optically anisotropic medium. We shall refer to this type of diffraction as birefringent since the refractive indices for the incident and diffracted

small for a broad Near F = l t8he phase mismatch remains range of acoustic frequencies. The diffraction bandwidth of the interaction for this degenerate case can be easily determined. Again we let & = 0.45 in (21) and obtain

Thus a significant bandwidthimprovement canbe tained with the birefringent phase matching.

ob-

6
100

IEEE TRANSACMONS ON SONICS AND ULTRASONICS, JANUARY

1976

#1--

BIREFINGENT PHASE MATCHING

v]

12
4

a
I 10 0
l Y

- 1 8 LILO

\
6

\
L/L"

\
\

'\
\

ORDINARY PHASE MATCHING&.

t OCTAVE BANDWIDTH

1
0

I
20%

I
40%

I
60%
80%
100% FRACTIONAL BANDWIDTH

Fig. 4.

Interactionlengthversusfractionalbandwidth for birefringent and isotropic phase matched diffractions.

Thelengthratio L / L o for birefringent and isotropic phase matching is plotted in Fig. 4 as a function of fractional bandwidth. We notice that the interaction length advantage of birefringent 90" phasematchingismost significant for relatively narrow fractional bandwidth. For a given bandwidth, this amounts to an interaction length advantage of 2jO/Aj, or about three times for octave fractional bandwidth. The fractional bandwidth can be further broadened by a factor of fi if one chooses momentum matching a t two frequencies and allows the efficiency at the center dip t'o be as low as 3 dB.'

interestedreaderisreferred to the excellent papers by Pinnow [l61 and by Uchida and Niizeki [17]. A good acoustooptic material must satisfy thefollowing conditions. It must be of good optical quality and availableinreasonablylarge size for deviceapplications. It should have low optical and acoustic attenuations, and it should have high acoustooptic figures of mcrit. The commonly used figures of merit are

111. ACOUSTOOPTICMATERIALS
In this sectlion, we briefly summarize the present state of the art of acoustooptic materials. We shall not discuss the subject of selection of new acoustooptic materials. The
(25)

' D. L. Hecht, private communication.

CHANG: ACOUSTOOPTIC INTERACTIONS,

7
TABLE I SELECTED ACOUSTOOPTIC MATERIALS
A c o u s t i c Wave Attenuation O p t i c a l Wave
a

F i g u r e s of Elerit

Optical Transmission Material F u s e dS i l i c a LiNbOj Ti02 Sr0,75Ba0.25Nb206 0.4-6 Diamond PbMo04 Te02 0.2-5 0.42-5.5
0.35-5
(W)
0.2-4.5

Mode and
Density P(dCrn3) 2.2 4.64 Propagation Direction
L

Velocity
V

dB/

(lOscm/sec) usec-ofr'
5.96
7.2

Refractive P o l a r i z a t i o nI n d e x D i rn c t i o n e 1.46 35oy rot. [OlO] 2.2

,
C

M1
1.

(m)
0.63.;

0.4-4.5

L[100]

6.57

0. I

0.635

8.5

4.23 5.4 3.52 6.95

6.0

L[ 1001
L[OOl] L[lOO] L[ODl]
L[OOI]

8.03 5.5 17.5 3.63 4.2

0. b2

-2.1 2.6 5.5

6.3 17.9

2.58 2.3 2.41 2.39 2.26 2.26 5.31 2.7 2.89 3.37 2.83 3.09
4 . a ~

0.633

8.3
34. i

if 11

0.633 0.589 0.633 0.633 0.633 0.633 1.06 0.633 1.15 0.635 1 .l5

9.6 14.6 17.6

13.1

L
CIR.

S(llO]

GaP AS12se55Ge33
As ,Se
GaAS

0.6-10 1-14 0.9-11

1-11

4.13
4.4

L[110]
1.

b. 32 2. 52 2.25 5.15 2.15 2.0 5.50

5.X
1.7

/l

75.3
54.4
204

L
/l

4.64 5.34 6.2 6.31 5.33

-. .
71)

L[IIfl] L(0011

15.5 S

l/

l18 IS-'
ibb

Tl,AsS4 T13PSea

0.6-12 0.85-8 2-20

//

L(0101
L11111 16.5

30

l/
11

It is seenthat thefigures of merit M I , 1113, and 42, can be determined from . M 2 and t,he index of refraction and acoustic velocity data of tjhe medium. The figure of merit can be determined from a measurement of diffraction 9 5Mz(XoZH)-'LPa. (27) efficiency (27) for a given acoustic power and aspect ratio. is used when only efficiency is of primary concern nixon and Cohen [21] described a simpletechnique of determining the magnitudeof M ? relative to that of fused (narrow-band device). one Besides efficiency, another important design parameter silica. From the measurement of 3f2, can determine the is bandwidth. From (19) i t is seen that the bandwidth is elastooptic coefficients pi? for the particular acoustic and proportional t o n V 2 . Thus to optimize efficiency band- optical modes involved. T h r sign of the p can be deterwidth product for a fixed power, the relevant figure of mined by static measurement or by a refractive deflection merit is then M 1 = A2,nV2, [S], [19]. From (14) and (19) t,echnique described recently by Rirgelscn [22]. Table I list,s the figurrs of meritandotheracoustic we have optical propertics of some selected acoustooptic 9 9Jf1(Xo3foAfH)-'Pa. (2s) and materials. The table is based on data from Pinnow [23], Adl is the most commonly used figure for deflector design Uchjda and Yiizeki [17], and the rrcent work on chalwhen the t,ransducer height H is constrained by fabrica- cogenide crystals by Gottlieh et al. [24]. The coefficient tion limits or electrical impedance considerations. When ao(dB,/rs-GHz*) is the acoustic attenuation unit per the transducer height is not constrained by these factors, time at f = 1 GHz, assuming t,he acoustir attenuation is but may be made as small as the optical beam size, then proportional top. The data of n , and V are tjaken from Ad3 = Men'lr should be used [20]. Let H W V / Af in (28) [l71 and [23], and the dataof ,Ifl, 1123, and M a are calcuthen we obtain lated values using (23)-(26). The figurrs of merit listed 7 M 9,143 ( X*3fO) -]Pa. (29) are normalized relativet o fused silica, which t h r f o l l o ~ has Finally, in thedesign of wideband deflectors or modulators ing absolute value of figures of merit: where the power density is the limitringfactor, M 4 = M 1 = 7.83 X 10-~ [crn2sg-'] ( T L V ~ ) is ~then applicable. From (14) and (19) we = 1.51 X I-' O' [s3g-'J obtain 17 E 16M4( Xo4f02Af2)-'Pd ( 30) . V 3 = 1.3 X lo-" [cms2g-'] A f 4 = 4.06 X lo5 where P d = P,/LH is the acoustic power density. [crn*s-'g-'].
The figure of merit [lS], [l91 relates the diffraction efficiency to the acoustic power for a given device geometry. From (14) we have

M,,

M ,

M,,

M ,

M,

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SONICS AND ULTRASONICS, JANUARY

1976

TABLE I1 PROPERTIESLiNbO: TRANSDUCER, OF ELECTRODES BONDING AND LAYEES

LiNbO 3 Transducers :
i

Mode
L
4. S
S

Orientation 35 OY 163OY 43 2 7 .43 X4

K
0.49 0.62 0.68

V ( l o 5 cm/sec)

= VV

( l o 5 g / s e c cm7)34.8 21.4

39

7.4 56 4.8

ElectrodeandBondingLayers:

EPOXY

2. 16.

2.6 2.25

86 4 62.5

1.34

__

1.22 l . 82 0.91 2.25 16 23.2

6.2

__
0.23

4.45

3 . 6 b e n z o a th e n y l P e In
AU

-8 6.4

3.04

0.02

A 1 71. 3

42 1.61

3. 0 . 0 2 24 6.
0. 5 . 6 50 2 5 5.01

1 .0 . 1 2

Ag

36.0

cu

40.6

__

16.7
2.11

18.3

__ __ __

that the transducer used should have large fractional band-that by careful control of contamination, uniform epoxy width with low conversion loss. Presently, the best layers about 0.1 pm thick could be obtained without too selected approachis the technique of bondingthin-plate piezo- much difficulty. Intermediate metallic layers with mechanical impedance could be used in the epoxy bonding electric transducers. Such techniques have been recently for broadband impedance matching purposes. Satisfactory reviewed by Meitzler C253 and by Sittig [ 2 6 ] . been obtainedup to 150 The problemareas inthe design andfabrication of and reproducibleresultshave MHz using epoxy bonding. At higher frequencies, ot,her transducers include: the development of new transducer bonding techniques (such as cold-weld bonding using materials with large electromechanical coupling constant me-tallic bonding layers) provide the best result,s. and low dissipation loss, the improvement of bonding ilmong these metallic layers, indium is the most comtechniques and reductionof transducer thickness for highmonly used [28]. Excellentbondingcan be repetitively frequency operations, and suitable design of the electrical obtained using low bonding pressure (=l000 psi) for a few circuit for broadband impedance matchingof transducers. seconds. The impedance of indium is reasonably close to Transducer Materials that of most substrates used. The major disadvantage of Recently, a variety of new piezoelectric transducer indium, as seen from Table 11, is its rather large acoust,ic materialshas beenavailable.Acompilation of data of attenuation at high frequencies. The at'tenuation of gold is very low and should be suitthese materials can be found in a paper by Meitzler [%l. Among these materials, LiYbO, probably is the most able forfrequencies above the 1-GHz range. Gold bonding widely used in practice. The essential propertiesof LiW)03 &h good results have been reported [ 2 7 ] , C291. HowC] are summarized in Table 11. Also listed in the table ever, since the mechanical impedance of gold is extremely % are the properties of several elcctrodo and bonding layers. high, it will be mismatched to most acoustooptic materials. Recently we have successfully accomplished the use of The data [ 2 5 ] , [a71 on the mechanicalimpedance and acoustic attenuation of the electrode and bonding materials aluminum as the bonding medium i n our laboratory. The are useful in the determinationof transducer performance. mechanicalimpedance of aluminum is close to that of indium. However, the acoustic att'enuation of aluminum Technology of Transducer Boding is only slightly higher than t'hatof gold. The high electrical The simplesttechniquc to bonda transducertoan conductivity of aluminum is another advantage for highacoustoopticmediumist,he use of an organicadhesive frequency applications. Transducer conversion loss less bond as suchepoxy. The extremely low mechanical than l d B has been obtained a t 350 MHz. impedance of epoxy (Table 11) is highly mismatched to The thickness of the bondedtransducershas tobe LiNbO, and other commonly used acoustooptic materials. reduced to a final dimensioncorresponding tothe fre-

IV. TRANSDUCER TECHSOLOGY Hence, the thickness of the epoxy layer must be kept to a small fraction of an acoustic wavelength. We have found For most acoustooptic device applications it is required

CEANO: ACOUSMOPTIC INTERACTIONS, I

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1.o

1 .l

1.2

1.3

1.4

NORMALIZED FREQUENCY

Fig. 5. Frequency dependence of transducer mismatch loss with shunt inductance tuning.

on Masonsequivalentcircuit,Sittig C321 and Meitzler and Sittig C331 have analyzed the frequency characteristic of multilayer t,ransducers including the effect of t,op electrode, bonding, and intermediate layers. For given transa ducer configurat,ion with chosen design parameters (mat,erial data, layer thickness, etc.), the transducer frequency response can be determined with digital computations. By taking into account the effect of series inductance, the calculated results generally agree with measured results. Various impedance matching networks based on filter synthesishave been developed [34]. Due to the large value of the electromechanical coupling const,ant of LiNbO, transducers, however, broadband impedance matching is obtainable without the use of elaborate matching techniques. The simplest, method is t)o resonate the transducer with a shunt inductance and transform the Transducer Impedance Matching source impedance level by using either ferrite transformers, One of the recurringproblems inthe fabrication of quarter-wave transmission lines, or LC ladder filters [%l. Calculations were made using the method of shunt inacoustoopticdeviceshas been the design of transducer impedancematchingnetworks.Since the dielectric con- ductance tuningfor the case of thin bonding, where one stant of LiNhOs is very high, the impedance level of trans- assumes the effects of internmcdiate layers and top electrode ducers for most devices operated above100 M H z is of the can be neglected. Fig. 5 shows the transducer mismatch loss 3fL as a function of the normalized frequency for a order of a few ohms.Because of t,his, the parasiticinductance of the connecting wires can dominate the trans- few choices of normalized nlechanical impedance of the ducer impedance even with a series induct,ance of a few medium zd = &(medium) / Z o(LiNbOa). The source im2.5XC, where X,= nanohenries. This will raise loaded Q of the transducer and pedance is chosen tobeequalto is the effectively lower the bandwidth. reduce the capacitance l / ( 2 ~ f ~ C ~ ) reactance of the clamped capacitance at To and raise the impedance level,one practice has beent o use the transducer resonance. We have found that transducer tuning with series inmult,iple series-connec,ted transducers. generally results in reduced fractional bandThe design of transducers generally starts with the ductance determination of transducerfrequency response. Based widt,h. Thus it isessential t o minimize series impedance in quency of operation. Mechanical lapping generally gives satisfactoryresultsforreducingthickness to about 3-6 microns. To further reduce the transducer thickness, techniques of sputter etching [27],C301 and ion milling [291, C311 have been developed. Recently, Huang et al. C291 have used the ion milling technique t o reduce the thickness of a gold-bonded shear-wave transducer to as low- as 0.25 micrometer, and achieved less than 20 d B oneway-loss operationupto 11 GHz. Applying thesame technique to an indium-gold bonded transducer, Stevenson and Hanak [31] have obtained similar results and have operated the transducer up to 5 GHz. They reported the very impressive result of achieving a one-way transducer conversion loss of less than 1 dB at an operating frequency of 1 GHz.

10

IEEE TRANSACTIONS

ON SONICS AND ULTRASONICS, JANUARY

1976

the construction of the coupling circuit for high-frequenq devices.

V. BASIC ACOUSTOOPTIC DEVICES Since its discovery,acoustoopticinteractionhas been used to perform various optical beam control functions. In this section we shall discuss the operation of three types of basic acoustoopt'ic devices. Thme devices are characterized by the three distinct regimes of interaction geometry depending on the parameter a = (68,/68,), the ratio of divergence angles of the optical beam, and theacoustic beam. In the limit a < l, the device acts as a deflector. < For t'he intermediate values a E 1, the device acts as a modulator. In the other limit a >> 1, the del ' serves as 'Ice an optical filter.
Dejlectors

T r k I
r - I

Acoustoopticinteractionprovides a simplemeans to I S -I I I deflect an optical beam a t high speed to a prescribed posiI I tion. The direction of the diffracted beam can be varied I I by changing t'he driving frequency of the acoustic wave. Fig. 6. Schematic of staircase uhased arrav transducers used in 4) acoustic beam steering design (after Kbrpel et al. ( ) . The angle between the undiffracted beam and first-order diffract'ed beam is equal to 2 sin-' (Aaf/3n,V-). Thus t,he total angle of deflection for a frequency change A j is eter of a n acoustoopticdeflector, and its maximization becomes the major goal of deflector design. A8d = XoAf/ (nV cos 4,). (31) In Section I1 we have analyzed t'he bandwidth limitaI n a deflection system, there are two important perform- tion of acoustooptic interactions. For a n is;ot,ropicB r a g ance parameters: resolution and speed. Resolution, or the cell utilizing a single planar t'ransducer, the tradeoff bemaximum number of resolvable angular positions, is de- tween efficiency and power o r porver density for a given fined as thc range of deflection angles divided by the angu- bandwidth is given by ( 3 8 ) or (30). It is swn that as the lar spread of the diffracted bean): bandwidth increases, boththe requiredacousticpon-er S = ~e~;se,. ( 3 2 ) and acoustic power density increase rapidly for attaining a given efficiency. The high-power drnsit'y is particularly k'or a deflector operated in the region \\-here thc diver- destructive since it canlead to (wxss hrating of transgence of the incident optical bram is much smaller than ducers. that of the acoustic heam, i.e., a = dB0j68, < l , t,he di< One method to reduce the power and power density vergence of the diffractcdheam is equal to that of the requirement is to steer the acoustic beam so tjhat it, tracks incident hcam and is givm C361 by: t,he Bragg angle with frequency.I n practicca, acoustic h a m steering is accomplished b y the use of a phased array of transducers. The simplest phased array uses fixed phase difference h e t w r n adjacent transducers that corresponds where D is tho width of the incident bean1 in the plane of to an acoustic delay of P22jt',where P is an intrger. This is known as first-order steering, which was first invest,ideflection and is a multiple factor (near unity) that 4 depends on thc amplitude distribution the optical beam gated by Icorpel et al. [ ] and Gordon [ 3 ] for P = 1. The of arbitrary integer P was investigated by at) the aperture and the criterion used for rctsc~lvahility extension to [36]. From ( 3 2 ) and ( 3 3 ) it follows that Pinnow [S71 and by Sittig [%l. Fig. 6 shows the schematic of a bcam steering dpsign = rAf:< (34) used by Icorpel et al. [ ] In this caw, t>he hcightof each 4. is where T = U / (l' cos 8,) is the acoustic transit time across step ischosen to be equal to *l0/2,whcrc -io t8hemid1)nnd acoustic wavelength. Thcneteffect of thetransduccr the optical bean-1. wavcfronts comb in(^ to The acoustic transit tirm is (.qual to the acccss time of phased array is that the individual thc the deflector and isa measure o f the sperd of the deflection form a corrugated wavefront. When acoustic frrquency system.Equation (34) thusdisplaysthe tradeoff rela- is changed, the effective propagation direction of the coma t,ionship bcttn-cm t'he resolution and speed of the acousto- bined wavefront. is tiltedtomaintainapproximately steeringangle 0' = ( l / % ) A - A O ) with respect, to the ( optic deflector. The deflector handwidth, beingproportional to the resolution and speed product, can be con- wavefront at, midband frequencies, where S is the spacing sidered as t,hc most important single performance param- between adjacent steps (Fig. C,). The phase mismatch for
A\

CEANO: ACOUSTOOPTIC INTERACTIONS, I

11

of 8, or equivalent to a reduction of power density by a factor of 64 compared t o isotropic deflectors. The use of beam steering and birefringent phase matching t,echniques greatly can reduce acoustic t,he power densit,y, and thus the bandwidth limitationacoustooptic of deflectors will beduemainly to the maximum power allowed. - '_ ( F - l ) ( F - - ? ) LI. L" (3.5) Besides bandwidth,thereareotherfactorsthatcan limit thc deflector resolution. In some applications where We thus arrivea t similar results as thecase of birefringent the speed of the deflector is not a major consideration, the 90" phasematching (21). When S = L,, the bandwidth resolution is limited by either the acoustic attenuation a t broadening due to bcam steering is also givenby ( 2 2 ) . the highfrequency or by the spatial constraint on the Although the effect of beam steering on first-order dif- optical aperture. For most crystalline solids, the acoustic fraction is similar to that of birefringent phase matching, attenuation is proportional to f.If we allow a maximum attenuation of S(dF3) , the maximum allowed value of the effect on second-order diffraction is quite different. acoustic transit time is T , = ~~~ y ~ f , , , . , 2 . Thus, when t,he ~ / The acoustic deflector beam steering provides additional deflector discrimination against second-order diffraction. Thus the acoustic attenuation is the limiting factor, the beam steering technique is more effective when the opera- resolution is given by tion of a n acoustooptic deflector over more than octave fractionalbandwidt'hisdesired. The analysisdescribed (371 here is only an approximation that is good when the number of transducers in the array is large. Pinnow C371 used which reduces to X,,, = 1/(a0Af) = ( T / ( Y ~ ) ~If' ~ we the radiationpattern concept, and carried out a more assume d = 4 dB, E = 1, and fmax = 2Af (octave band: accurate analysis. width). In first-order beam steering, exact momentum matching E'ig. 7 shows the estimated acoustooptic deflector resoluis maintained a t only two distinct frequencies, i.e., F = 1 tion versus access time foraselection of acoustooptic and F = LO/s (3.7). By using large arrays of transducers materials. The limitsof performance are determined based in where the phases of eachtransducerelementareindion the following assumptions: the aperture size is limited vidually varied, Couqin et al. [l31 have extended the to 5 centimeters, the maximum attenuation is limited to beam steering techniquet o near perfect momentum match- 4 dB, and thebandwidth is limited to ~ l O O ( ~ ~ f l MHz. )l~z ingover the hand. The price to pay in that case is, of Fig. 7 shows that the maximum resolution of acoustooptic course, t'he complexity of the design. deflectors is probably limited t o a few thousand. A differentapproach t o reducc the power or power The tradeoff relation (34) between resolution and speed density is the use of 90" phase matching birefringent dif- is limited to first-order diffraction of a single deflector. It fraction (Section 11) [ S ] , [lS]. The centerfrequency fo is possible to increase the resolutionwithoutchange of of the deflector must he chosen to he close to either the bandwidth or the transit time by using several first order diffraction for the beam steering case becomes, from (17), deflect'ors in cascade 1421. High-orderdiffraction could be used to increase Ai', however, the correspondingdiffraction efficiency is too low t o be practical. One interwhere A n is the hircfringence. This frequc.ncy is, in general, esting approach is to utilize the second-order diffraction in a birefringent deflector.At fd, the first- and second-order vcryhigh. The first such type of birefringentdeflector matched, enmadeby Ilean et al. [l.',] used the uniaxialcrystal of diffraction are exactlydegeneratelyphase abling higher diffraction efficiency into the second order. sapphire. The value of fo is 1.56 GHz, a frequency too high By utilizing this technique, Chang and Hecht c431 have for many applications. Oneimportant birefringent deflector is the TeOz de- recentlydemonstrated thc operation of a second-order doubled flector using the shear wave propagating the [l101 axis. birefringent TeO, deflector andhaveobtained resolution maintaining diffraction high efficiency. 1200 The original configuration, proposed f)y Uchida and Ohmachi [39], utilized the anomalously low shear wave spot was achieved with 25 microseconds access time and velocity andhigh figure of meritin TcOz [39], [ M ] . 2.5 >[Hz bandwidth. Warner et al. C411 recognized thatthe circular birediodulators fringence in TeOz can be used for broadband operation in a 90" phasematchingconfiguration.Since the circular The acoustooptic interaction has also been used to birefringence is small, fd occurs below 100 J'IHz for visible modulate light. Both amplitude and frequency modulators light; e.g., fd is equal to 37.4, 63.3, and 85 MHz for the can be achieved [S], 1441. Gordon [3] showed that for wavelengths of 632.8 nm, 4S-58 nm, and 441.6 nm, respec- proper modulator operation, the divergence of the optical tively. For a fractional bandwidth of 50 percent, Warner beam should be about equal to that of thc acoustic beam, i.e., a = 60,/60, X 1. I n order to match the Rragg condiet al. [41] demonstrated an int,craction length advantage

12

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SONICS AND ULTRASONICS,

JANUARY

1976

-.-.-.-..
5.000

L I M I T BY BANDWIDTH L I M I T BY A T T E N U A T I O N LIMIT BY APERTURE

2.000

1,000

0 +
3
2
v)

500

0
& !
200

100

50

20

10 0.1

1
0.2

I
0.5

I
1.0

1
2.0

I
5.0

1
10

I 20

I
50

I
100

ACCESS TIME (prec)

Fig. 7. Resolution versus access time for acoustooptic deflectors.

tion over the modulat,or bandwidth, the acoustic beam should be made narrow, as in the case of deflectors. Unlike the case of deflectors, however, the optical beam should also have a divergence approximately equal to that of the acoust,ic beam, SO that thecarrier and thesidebands in the diffracted light will mix collinearly at the detector to give the intensity modulation. The actual value of the divergence ratio depends on the tradeoff between desired efficiency and modulation bandwidth. The divergent optical beam can be obtained by simple focusing optics. The diffraction geometry for an acoustooptic modulator is shown in Fig. 8. I n most applications we shall be concerned with an incident laser beam which has a Gaussian distribution with beam waistof diameter a d. The corresponding optical beam divergence is (38) The acoustic wave is assumed to be generated from a flat transducer of width L . The corresponding acoustic beam divergence is
68, =
A
-

i l

DIFFRACTED

LENS

-+z

TRANSDUCER

Fig. 8.

Diffractiongeometry of acoustoopticmodulator.

I,

(39)

where A is the acoustic wavelength. In terms of the optical and acoustic bcam dimensions, the divergence ratio a is given C451 by

The choice of the interaction length I, in the modulator design depends on the choice of a, which requires a calculation of the diffract,ionof a Gaussian beam from a modulated acoustic wave. One way to accomplish this is to decompose the Gaussian beam into plane waves and apply the planewavesolution (1Fi) as in a standardFourier analysis. The simple ca.sc of amplitude nmdulat'ion was analyzed by Gordon [S], and based his on analysis, numericalcalculations were made. The results are summarized in Figs. 9 and 10. Fig. 9 shows the dependence of the modulation bandwidth on the divergence ratio a. A t

13
CHANG: ACOUSTOOPTIC INTERACTIONS, I

0.7

0.6

0.5
:,f

0.4

0.:

0:

I
1

I
2
a =

I
3
Al ,IOPTICALI i,
, ta Al IACOUSTIC)

I
4

1.o

0.8

06

RELATIVE DIFFRACTED
LIGHT

INTENSITY
0.4

0.:

l
1

I
2

I
3

I
4

l
5

14

IEEE TRANSACTIONS

ON SONICS AND ULTRASONICS, JANUARY

1976

low values of a, the modulation bandwidth approaches the limit (41) fm 0.75,~ where T = d/V is the acoustictransittime across the optical beam. As a increases, bandwidth starts to decrease, while the peak intensity of the diffracted beam starts to build up as shown in Fig. 10. The proper choice of a thus depends on the tradeoff between modulation bandwidth and peak diffraction efficiency. A plot of the product of bandwidth and peak intensity as a function of a shows a broad maximum between 1.5 and 2. The modulation bandwidth in this region is approximately given by
fm

laser television display, Korpel et al. [ ] adaptedthe 4 Scophony principle to achieve high efficiency without loss of bandwidth due to finite beam size. The laser beam was chosen wide enough to illuminate several picture elements in the modulator. The image of these picture elements, which travels across the beam a t sound velocity, was made stationary on the screen by directing the image through a horizontal deflector. The informationhandwidth of t,he Scophonymodulatorinthis case is not limited by the acoustic transit time and is thus equal to the interaction bandwidth of the device. Longer interaction could be used for improved efficiency if techniqucs such as beam steering or birefringent phase matching are used.

W 0.65/r.

(42)

I n many respects the principle of acoustooptic diffraction is similarto thatof a transmission diffraction grat,ing. One naturally raises question whether the acoustooptic the deflector can also be used as a dispersive element in an optical spectrometer. One obvious advantage of the acoustooptic grating is that the grating constant (which is equal to the acoustic wavelength) can be electronically changed, thus providing a capability of rapidly scanning the spectral region. I n practice, however, acoustooptic deflectors utilizing isotropic diffraction have not been found useful in optical spectrometer applicat.ions. One reason is the relatively poor resolving power obtainabe with the acoustooptic deflectors. The resolving power R = Xo/AX isequal to the total numher of lines on t,he Xofo grating, and for an acoustooptic deflector it is thus approxien = 2n T/ mately equal t,o fr, where f is the acoustic frequency and 7 is the acoustic transit time across the optical apcrture. and the diffraction angle of the Gaussian beam The acoustic frequency used has to he sufficiently high in 4x0 order t o achieve even a modcrate resolving power. The aea = maximum resolving power is thus limited by the acoustic m d attenuation at the high frequency end. it follows the lower limit of the acoustic frequency is given A more fundamental reason why this approach is imby practical is thatthe angularaperture associated with isotropic diffraction is proportional to the optical bandS .m=-. (43) widthand is exceedingly small. Thisis becausein the Ti isot,ropic diffraction, a changeof angle of t,hc incident light We may combine (42) and (43) to determine a limit will introduceamomentummismatch(seeFig. 2 ) . To of modulator bandwidth of acoustooptic modulators: achieve a wide angular aperture, the momentum matching condition with a fixed acoustic wavevector must be mainfo 4fm (44) tained for a large spread of incidence angles. As we have i.e., the modulation bandwidth is approximately equal to previously noted, this condition is approximately met in 25 percent of the midband acoustic frequency. I n view of the collinear acoustooptic interaction in birefringent crysthe present status of transducer technology, the modula- tals. At f m i n , the loci of the incident and diffracted light tionbandwidth of acoustoopticmodulatorsisprobably wavevectors are parallel, and t>ofirst order in the change limited to several hundred MHz. of incidence angle, the momentum mismatch is zcro. In certainapplicationssuchas the laserdisplay [ ] Harris el al. first proposed C141 and then experimentally 4 where the acoustoopticmodulator is used in asystem C481 demonstrated the operation of a collinear acoustowhich scans a line at a uniform scan velocity, i t is possible optic filter. LiNbO, was used as the medium, and tuning to use a much broader optical beam in modulator than from 700 to 550 nm was obtained. The optical bandwidth the would be allowed by the transit time limitations (42). The mas about 2 A. A later design using Ca3ioOc hada similar key to this approachis the ingenioustechnique of the tuning range, a resolution of S A, and a peak transmission Scophonylightmodulator [46], [ 7 . In their work on of 9.5 percent [ 9 . 4] 4]

Maydan [45] has treated in detail the important case of pulsed modulators. His results show that in the optimum design, a z l.Fi, which yieldsrisetime a (10-90%,) of t, Z 0.857. The choice of a for the design of continuous wave or pulsed modulators amounts to LILO 2 3, C451 indicating that the Bragg regime approximation is valid for modulator operations. One requirement in the design of acoustooptic modulators is that the diffracted beam and undiffracted beam must be well separated. For an adequate extinction ratio, the Bragg angle should be a t least as large as the divergence of the optical beam. Thiscondition puts a minimum value on the center frequency. Equating the Braggangle

Filters

CHANG: ACOUSTOOPTIC INTERACTIONS, I

15

INCIDENT LIGHT

ACOUSTIC TERMINATION

zcl POLARIZER

RF POWER AMPLIFIER

TUNABLE RF OSCILLATOR

Fig. 11. Schematic of transmissive type collinear acoustooptic filter (after Harris et al. (49)).

A schematic of the collinear acoustooptic filter is shown in Fig. 11. Note that the incident optical beam and the diffracted optical bean1 have different polarizations and are separable from each other by the use of polarizers. At a fixed RF frequency, only a narrow band of optical waves will be diffractedandtransmittedthroughtheoutput polarizer. The center wavelength of the passband can be scanned by changing the frequency of the R,P signal. At the center of the passband Akl = 0, (6) for collinear interaction reduces to k , = kl - k, = ( % r h o ) (nl - no),which yields a relation between the center of t.he passbandX0 and the acoustic frequency f:
&An

the resolving power of the acoustooptic filter is equal to

.fr, as one probably espected.

The same phase mismatch results if the angular deviation Atlo reaches the value

(!!S>
An

while AA z The total solid acceptance angle external to 0. the medium C501 is
AQ M Tl% -. An I,

(48)

In crystal quartz, thephase velocity and group velocity of the shear xave polarizedalong the s-axis are non= collinear; i.e.,the acoustic beamwalks off from the acoustic where A n = I nl - 110 1 is the birefringence. Equation (45) wave front. Kusterset al. c511 demonstrated that acoustooptic filters with large angular aperture could be obtained is the tuning relation of the collinear acoustooptic filter. with the incidentlightpropagatingcollinearlywith the The optical bandwidth and angular aperture characterisgroup velocity. The collinearity of light and acoustic tics of the collinear acoustooptic filter can be easily deterthe advantagc maximizing interaction of mined phase from mismatch considerations. A Taylor group velocity has series expansion of phase mismatch for small wavelength lengt,h and optimizing efficiency. Chang C521 described a configuration in which the light beam change AA and angular deviations Atlo near the collinear filter is chosen interaction (e, = 8 0 = 0) yields, from ( 2 0 ) , collinear with the acoustic phasr vrlocity. The large angular aperture characteristics retained, the arc hut, light beam soon walks out of the acoustic beam and result,s in higher acoustic power. Yeverthelcss, the walkoff configuration has t,he advantage of large tuning range sinre multiple transducers can he used. Tn the \valkoff quart,z filter [X], tuning of optical wavdength from 2.50 to 650 where b is the dispersive constant [14]. To determine the nm was obtained. The collincarity requirement limits the filter materials filter resolution, we assume a collimat,ed light beam to rather restricted classes of crystals. Somr crystals with (A80 Oj, and let 1 61 0 4 5 (46)to obtain . . in very high figures of merit, e.g., TcO?, are excluded for (47) collinear filter application because of symmetry considcrations. For such materials, it, may be possihlc to oprrate thc Neglecting dispersion, b M 3 r A n , (45) and (47) show that filter in a noncollinear configuration. However,thc angular

(45)

16
2 (OPTIC AXIS)

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SONICS AND ULTRASONICS, JANUARY

1976

size and resolving power, the large angular aperture characteristics makes the entendue of acoustooptic filter better than the grating by two orders magnitude. of VI.APPLICATIONS Acoustooptic devices can used in a variety of applicabe tions. Here we shall discuss only a few of them that appear most practical or most promising in future developments.

Dejlectors
One of t'he first system applications of an acoustooptic deflector was the horizontal deflection in a laserTV display described by Korpel el al. [4j. This system used water as the interaction medium. Beam steeringwas used to achieve a 3-dB resolution of about 200 resolvable TV elements. Later developments included the increase of resolution by using two deflectors cascade [42]. In thewater cells, the in bandwidth of these deflectorswas relatively low (16 MHz), and good resolution was achieved because of the use of a relatively long transittime.The development of new acoustoopticmaterialssuchasPbRlo04and TeOz has made it possible t o increase the deflector bandwidth significantly. Pinnow et al. C551 constructedtwo-stage a X - Y deflector using PbMoOl as the deflector medium. The bandwidthof each deflector was 80 RfHz. These highspeed deflectors provided fast, random-access readout in a n optical holographic memory system [56]. Gorog et al. described a TV rate laser scanner using a PbMoOI deflector C571 or a birefringent TeOz cell deflect'or C583 as the horizontal deflector. With approximately 50 mW average drive power a t television horizontal scan rate, the TeOz deflector had an average deflection efficiency of 50%. The resolut,ion of the deflector was about 500 spot's. An interesting application of acoustooptic deflectors using the multifrequency mode was described by Hrbek and Watson c591 in a high-speed laser alphanumeric generator based on acoustooptic components. The system includes a first Bragg cell that was driven by seven frequencies. Each signal can be individually turned on or off, thus forming a vertical line of seven dots. , second Bragg 4 cell acts as a horizontal scanner. In this manner, a 5 X 7 matrix character was generated, with a writling speed in excess of 100 000 characters per second. This has application to hard-copy printingas well ascomputeroutput microfilm (COJI) printing.

Fig. 12. Wavevectorconstruction for acoustoopticinteractionin noncollinear filter (after Chang (53)).

aperture associatedwith the noncollinear interactionis generally small. very To overcome this disadvantage, Chang [53j describedmethod a t,o obtain wide-angle filter operation in a noncollinear interaction configuration. The method is based on the compensation of momentum mismatch due to the angular change of incident light by the angular change of birefringence of the extraordinary wave. As shown in Fig. 12, the acoustic k-vector is chosen so that the tangents to the incident and diffracted light wave vect,orloci are parallel. Thus, for a change in incident light direction, the moment'um matching is still approximatelymaintained. In the describednoncollinearfilter, TeOz was used as thefilter medium. The filter was tunable from 700 to 450 nm wit,h a half-power bandwidth of 40 1 a t a n f/4 aperture. Nearly 100% transmission was obtainedwithadrive power about 120 milliwatts. One interestingfeature of the noncollinear filter is that the diffractedopticalbeamisspatiallyseparatedfrom the incident optical beam so that the filter could be operated without the use of polarizers. This angle of separation for the TeOn filter is equal to 3.S". The wavelength range of acoustooptic filters has been extended to infrared regions of the spectrum.Recently, Feichtner et aE. [M reported the operation of a collinear . ] filter using TlsAsSc3 as the filter medium. The filter was tested at 3.39 and 3.3 micrometers. I n concluding this section it is instructive to compare the performance of acoustoopticfiltersanddiffractive gratings. The resolving power of the filter (47) is limited by the available size of the filter medium. Considering a LiNhO, filter with an interaction length 10 centimeters, of (47) gives a calculated half-power bandwidth of 0.18 a t X = 0.5 micrometer. This corresponds to a , resolving power of the order of 38 000,a number much less than one could achieve with a high-resolution grating. Although its spectral resolving power is notlargc,the acoustooptic filter has an entendue advantage. Assuming equal aperture

Modulators
Acoustooptic modulators have become increasingly popularinrecentyearsdue t,o theirmanyadvantages such as low drive power, high extinctionratio, insensitivity to temperature changes, and simplicity in design and construction. The application of acoust'ooptic modulators in the infrared is attractive due to the existence of several superior infrared acoustooptic materials. Design and construct,ion of acoustooptic modulators for communication

CEANQ: ACOUSTOOPTIC INTERACTIONS,

17

applications in the infrared were reported for 1.06 [So], 3.39 [Sl], and 10.6 micrometers [Sl], [62]. Another type of acoustoopticmodulatorinvolves the use of standing acoustic waves. Large modulationis attainable a t low drive power due to the enhancement of diffraction efficiency caused by acoustic resonance. The standing wave device is usable over a narrow band of frequenciesnear the aoousticresonance and is basically a single frequency modulator. Tsai and Yao [SS] described and demonstrated theuse of standing wave modulators as multiplexers and demultiplexers in an optical pulse-code modulation syst,em. The use of a n acoustoopticmodulatorinsidealaser cavity has been another major application area. This is because the acoustooptic effect occurs in crystals of all classes and amorphous solids, and acoustooptic materials with excellent opticalqualities are easy to find.These intracavity applications include Q-switching [S4], mode locking [Ss], andcavitydumping [W]. Q-switching of Nd-YAG lasers [S71 has been of technicalimportance due to its applications to material scribing, resistor trimming, and circuit etching. I n nearly acoustooptic all Q-switches used today, fused silica is employed primarily because of its excellent optical quality and high threshold for optical damage. The acoustooptic modulator generally operates in the undiffracted mode; i.e., when R F power the is on, the acoustic diffraction of light introduces loss in the cavity and quenches the laser oscillation, and when the RF is off, the laser Q-switches and emits high peak power pulses. The early designby Chesler et al. [S71 utilized longitudinal acoustic waves. I n fused silica, the elastooptic coefficient p12is larger than p l l , resulting in five times greater diffraction efficiency for light polarized perpendicular t o the propagation direction of the acoustic wave. The laser will always choose t o oscillate inthepolarizationthat experiences the minimum loss. Thus theQ-switch operates inthe polarizationwith the low diffraction efficiency. Because of this, shearwave has generally been usedso that the operation of the Q-switch is insensitive to the state of polarization. Due to thelow figure of merit of this mode, substantial RF power (greater than 50 watts) is generally required to hold off a laser with a moderate gain. Techniques have been developed to use the longitudinal mode more effectively by use of additional quarter-wave plates [SS], so that in a round trip both thelow-loss polarization state and the high-loss polarization state are used and result in effective increase of total loss. We have chosen a different design that uses a cascade of X and Y deflectors. Using Q-switches based on this scheme, high power YAG lasers have been completely quenched with acceptable RF drive power. I n mode-locking applications, a standing wave acoustooptic modulator is used inside the cavity and introduces a loss modulation with a frequency that is equal to the difference between axial mode oscillations. The loss modulation effectively locksthe modes and results a sequence of in

short optical pulses. For mode locker applications, fused silica is generally used for the visible and Ge [S91 for 10.6 pms. Acoustooptic modulators can also be used outside the laser cavity for mode locking [70], which has been useful in optical hetrodyne applications. In the &-switching operation, the repetition rate has been limited by the time to repump t,he population inversion. Cavity dumping, firstdeveloped by Maydan [SS], is one way to obtain optical pulses a t repetition rates higher than 100 kHz. the In cavity-dumping scheme, short acoustic pulses (-a few nanoseconds) are fed t,o a fast acoustooptic modulatorthat performs as an outputcoupler in a laser cavity. The cavity is always kept above threshold, and the repetition rate only limitedby the switching is speed of the modulator. Cavit,y dumping provides a technique t o obta.in nanosecond laser pulses withhigh peak powers. It has also been shown that in the cavitydumping mode, average power close to that of the CW laser is possible [SS]. These superior performances make thecavitydumper useful inapplicationssuch as laser machining and image recording on thin films [71]. Recently, Johnson C721 described an efficient scheme for coherentcavitydumping of mode-locked lasers. Sirnultaneous mode locking and Q-switching has also been reported [73].

Filters
The tunable optical filter is the newest member of thn acoustooptic device family. As such, its application is yet a t a n early stage. Because of their unique characteristics, acoustooptic filters should useful for a variety of applicabe tions.Some of the salientfeatures of the acoustooptic filter include: electronic tuning with fast scan rat,e, high optical transmission, moderate resolving power, large angularaperture,capability of operating in sequential, random access, and multiwavelength modes, etc. Due to the recentdevelopment, of acoustoopticfilters in the ult,raviolet and infrared regions, special purpose spectrometers usingthesefilters are expected toappear soon. Other applications include: t,uning o dye lasers [74], radiomef try, laser detection, and multispectral imaging. Recently, we have demonstrated color filtered imaging using a TeOz noncollinear acoustooptic filter. The filter ha,d a n optical passband of 200 A, an external angular aperture of f/4, and was t,unable over the visible spectrum. 1Vit.h a filter aperture of 2 mm, image resolution better than lines/mm 30 was obtained. The filter color can be switched in a period of 5 microseconds. Figure 13 shows a phot,ograph of the image of resolut,ion test chart illuminated by a whit'e light source through t'he filter operating nearpm. The picture 0..5 was obtained without the use of polarizers. The diffracted (green) image was spatially separated from undiffracted (white) image. The angle of separation was equal to 6'. The drive power for the filter was about 200 mW. A a result of the low drive power, i t should be possible t o s construct aperture large filters for improved image resolutions.

18

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SONICS AND ULTRASONICS, JANUARY

1976

Fig. 13. Images of resolution test chart through TeOz acoustooptic filter. Undiffractedwhiteimage(right)and diffracted green image (Left) are separated by 6".
LENS (FOURIER TRANSFORM)

LASER

BEAM EXPANDER CELL IANAMORPHIC)

BRAGG

FREQUENCY PLANE

ZERO ORDER STOP FREQUENCY 1

ELECTRONIC INPUT

FREQUENCY 2

Fig. 14. Basic apparatus of acoustoopticspectrumanalyzer.

CHANG: ACOUSMOPTIC INTERACTIONS, I

1 9

Signal Processors
Another important area of application may be classified as signal processing. This includes pulse compression C7.51, [76], opticalcorrelation C771 andspectrum analysis of RF signals [78]. A thorough review of acoustooptical signal processors was given by Damon et al. [79]. The application of acoustooptics to the spectrum analysis of RF signals is of particularly practical importance. I n the following we shall briefly describe the principles of operation and report some of t,he recent development$. Fig. 14 shows the basic apparatus of an acoustooptic spectrum analyzer, which displays t'he frequency spect,rum of an incoming RF signal applied t o the electrical input. The display is obtained h?; the acoust'ooptic diffraction of the laser beam in the Bragg cell. A4nanamorphic beam expander is used to fill the whole optical aperture of t8he Bragg cell, while a cylindrical Fourier transform lens resolves the signal hcamx as diffractrd limited spots in the frcyuency plane. T h r relative intensities of the diffracted light in thefrequency plane are proportional to the power density spectrum in the input RF signal. The amplitude and phase o f each signal beam is modulated according t o the modulation of the RF signals. The instantaneous RF spectrum of the incoming signalsare thus recorded. Typical output modes arc directlaser beam display,film recording, and multichannel photoelectronic detection, Thus the acoustooptic spectrum analyzer offers a unique technique for analyzing wideband signals in a nonxanning fashion. Fig. l5 shows a photograph of a compact, size acoustooptic spectrum a.nalyzc:r developed in our laboratory, habing a resolution o f 1 3ZHz in a bandnidth of 200 AlHz. Experimental results n i t h a 200 MHz handwidt>h Bragg cell with l20 kHz resolution used in a spcctrum analyzer was reported by Hecht [tjo].Fig. 16 shows a sample of simultaneous recording of two wideband signals that. arc asynchronously swept and chopped. Hecht [ X l ] also analyzed the cffcct of multifrequency signals applied to an acoustooptic deflector, including compression, cross m(JdUlation, and intermodulation. I3andwidths up tjo 700 JTHz have been achieved using LiN1,03 as theaeoustooptic medium. I n view of the recent advances in transducer fabrication technology, bandwidths up to several GHz mayeventuallybeachieved. This would be very significant in radar processing applirations.

Fig. 15. Photograph of acoustooptic spectrum analyzer.

VII. CONC1,USIOiiI n t'his paper we have attempted to present a unified review of the principles of bulk-wave acoustooptic devices. The bandwidth and angularaperturecharacteristics of the devices are discussed in terms of the simple considerations of phase mismatch of acoust,ooptic interactions. The present status of acoustooptic materials, transducers, and device design, as well as areasof application, are reviewed. We have restricted our discussions on acoustoopt,ic devices based on diffraction of light by acoustic waves. Refractive deflection of light due t o index gradients has

Fig. 16. Recording sample of RF frequency spectrum of time (after Hecht (SO)).

function

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SONICS AND ULTRASONICS, JAKUARY

1975

also been used for device applications [8%],[XS]. In particular, we should ment,ion the traveling wave acoustic lens approach described by Foster et al. [83]. This technique has potential for significantly increasing the resolution of scanners. In practical applications, acoustooptic devices h a w t o competr: tvith mechanical and elcctroopticdevices. The actual choice of the approach depends on the specific requirements for the application. I n general, the parameters of performance to be considered are efficiency, speed, and resolution. The comparison of acoustooptic devices with mechanical and electrooptic devices is thus to be madeon the basis of speed and/or resolution, assuming a certain level of efficiency is attained. For deflector applications, the performance of acoustooptic devices appears to suit the middle range between mechanical and electroopticdevices.hlechanical devices (such as galvanometerdeflectors)generallyhavelargw resolution, but their speed is slower. Electrooptic d e flectors, on the other hand, have smaller resolution: tmt withfaster response. I n general,acoust,ooptic deflectors are expected to provide a favorable approach, excclpt in high-resolution scanner applications where galvanometer deflectors are probably preferred. An approximate boundary line between the two approaches may be set by the resolution of 1000 spots. kor modulatorapplications, the acoustooptic devices offer the advantages of low operating voltagc: and l o w drive power, high extinction ratio, simple drsign, rugged construction,insemitivitytoternperaturc changes, and high safety factors. Thus acoustooptic modulators are generally preferred to their electrooptic counterparts except in those applications where very large bandwidths are required. For modulation bandwidths more than approximately 1 0 MHz, the basiclimitation of acoustic 0 transit time in an acoustooptic modulator makes the electrooptic modulator more attractive. Acoustooptic filtersare expected to be useful in a variety of app1icat)ions. In the opinion of t,his autllor, t8hey could be one of the no st, exciting areas of bulk-wave acoustooptice devices for the next few years. In the areaof optical spectrometers, the relatively low-rt:solution acoust>oopt,ic filters will be useful primarily for special purpose applications such as fast scanning multichannel spectrometers. The prospect of futureimprovement of acoustoopt,ic devices is good, depending primarily on the developnlent of superior acoustooptic materials and efficient broadband tmnsducers a t high frequencies. Pinnow [l61 has studicd in detail the propcrties of acoustooptic nlatwials, and he shows that thcrct is a n empirical tradcoff rclation h t w r w ~ figure of merit and acoustic attenuation. This appears to set an ultirnatc limit, on t,heachievableperformance of acoustoopticdevices. On the other hand, thcrcseems to hc no furldanlental limit. on the possilAc improvenlent o f tratLsducrxr perforrnancc.. As a rcsult of the recent progrrss of transducer tcchnology, transducers with a convwsion loss of a few dB and an octave bandwidth operat,ing at,

sevmal (;Hz arc cxpectecl to beavailable inthenear future. This \vi11 llavc. the effect of further improving the speed o f acoustooptic devices. ACKKOWLEDGhLENT The autthor would like to thank Dr. D. L. Hecht for many clarifying and helpful discussions. Many thanks are also due I)r. C. H. Crumly for his critical reading of the manuscript andfor his rcmindcrto me ahout the Scophony light modulators.

REXXRENCES
[ l ] h,1. Born and E. Wolf, Principles of Optics, ThirdEdition, Pergamon Press, New York, 1965, ch. 12. K. Winslow, Inter[2] C. F. Quate, C. D. W. Wilkinson, and action of Light and Microwave Sound, Proc. ZEEE, Vol. 53, Oct. 1965, pp. 1601-1623. [3] E. I. Gordon, A Review of Acousto-OpticalDeflection and Proc. ZEEE, Vol. 54, Oct. 1966, pp. hfodulat.ion Devices, 1391-1401. [4] A,.Korpel, R. Atller, P. Desmares, and W. Watson, A Teleof vlslonDisplayUsingAcousticDeflectionandModulation Coherent Light, Proc. ZEEE Vol. 54, Oct. 1966, pp. 1429-1437. [5] R. W . Dixon,AcousticDiffraction of LightinAnisotropic Media, ZEEE J . Quantum Electron., Vol. QE-3, Feb. 1967, pp. 85-93. [6] N. Bloombergen, Nonlinear Optics. Benjamin, New York, 1965, ch. 4. [7] I. C. Chang. Coupled Wave Theory for Acousto-Optic Interactions in Anisotropic Media, to he published. [8] J. F. Npe, Physical Properties o j Crystals. ClarendonPress, Oxford, England, 1967. [9] D. F. Nelson and hl. I,ax, (New Symmetry for Acousto-Optic Scattering, P h y s . Rev. Lett., Vol. 24, Feb. 1970, pp. 378-380. Theory of Photoelastic Interaction, Phys. Rev., Vol. B3, Apr. 1071, pp. 2778-2794. [l01 G. A. Couqln, Acousto-Optic Interactions in Piezoelectric at t,he 1960 IEEE Ult.rasonics Symp., Crvstals, uresented St,.-T,ouiS, f i ~ . 1111 P. Phariseau. On the Diffraction of IiehtbvProaessive Supersonic Wa-ves, Proc.Zndian Acacl. L%., vol. 43A, Oct. 1956, pp. 165-170. [l21 W. R. Klein and R. D. Cook, Unified Approach to Ultrasonic Light Diffraction, I E E E Trans. Sonics Ultrason., Vol. SU-14, July 1967, p p . 123-134. [l31 G. A . Couqin, ,J. P. Griffin, and L. K. Anderson, Wide-Band Acoustn-Oof,ic lleflctors Usine Acoustic h a m Steerine. I E E E Trahs. Sonics Ultrason Vol. SIJ-17, Jan. 1970, pp. 3 4 4 0 . 1141 , E. Harris and R.. W. $allace. Acousto-Ootlc Tunable , _ _ S. ..~~.. ~. Filter, J . O p f .Soc. Am., Vol. 59, J u i e 1969, p 744-747. [l51 E. G. 1. I,ean, C. F. Quate,and H. J. ihaw, Continuous Deflection of I m e r Beams, A p p l . Ihys. Lett., Vol. 10, Jan. .. 1967, pp. 48-51. [l61 D. A . Pinnow, Guided Lines for the Selection of Acouto-Optic Mat.erials. I E B E J . Qunntwm Electron. Vol. QE-6. Aor. 1970. pp. 223-258. [l71 N. Uchitla and N. h-iizeki, .4cousto-Optic Deflection Materials andTechniques, Proc. ZEEE, Vol. 61, Aug. 1973, pp. 10731002. [l81 T. %I. Smithand A . Korpel,Measurement of LighbSound Interaction Efficiency in Solids, I E E E J . Quantum Electron., (oorresp.), Vol. QE-1, Sept. 1965, pp. 283-284. [l91 E. I. Gordon, Figures of Merit,forAcousto-OpticDeflection andModulat,ionDevices, I E E E J . Quantum Electron. (corresp.), Vol. QE-2, May 1966, pp. 104-105. 1201 R. W. Dixon,PhotoeLmtiaProperties of Selected Materials ant1 Their Relevxnce,tfor Applications t,o Acoustic Light ModulatorsantiScanners, J . Appl.Phys., Vol. 38, Dec. 1967, pp. 5149-5153. [21] R . W. Dixon ant1 M . G. Cohen, A New Technique for Measuring i?Iagnit,utles of Photoe1ast)ic Tensors and its Application to LithiumNiobate, Appl.Phys.,Lett., Vol. 8, Apr. 1966, pp. 205-207. [22] D.K. Riegelsen, ~JltrasonicTechnique for Measuring The Absolute Signs o f Photoelastic Coefficient,s and its Application to Fused Silica mid Cadmium Molybdate, A p p l . Phys. Lett., Vol. 22, Mar. 1973, pp. 221-223. I231 D. A. Pinnow, Elast,o-O t,ical Materials, in CRC Handbook of Lasers, R.J. Pressley, &d. Cleveland, Ohio: The Chemical Rubber Co., 1971. [24] M . Gotklieb, T. ,J. Isaacs, J . D. Feichher, and G . W . Roland,

9;

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CgANG: ACOUSTOOPTIC INTERACTIONS,

21
I

Aroust,o-Ontic Pronerties of Some Chalcoeenide Crvst,als. ._.~ .~~ . . J . A p p l . P h i s . , Vol. 45, Dec. 1974,pp. 5145-5151. [25] A. H. Meitzler, Piezoelectric Transducer Materials and Tech100 MHz, niques for UltrasonicDevicesOperatingAbove in UEtrasonicTransducer Materials. O.E. Mattiat, Ed. Plenum, New York, 1971. [26] E. K. Sittig, Design and Technology of Piezoelect.ric Transducers for Frequencies Above 100 MHz, in Physical Acoustics Vol. IX, W. P. Mason andR. N. Thurston,Eds. Academic Press, New York, 1972. [27] J. D. Larson, I l l , and D. K. Winslow, IJltrasonically Welded Piezoelectric Transducers. ZEEE Trans. Sonics.. Ultrason.. V l SU-18, July 1971, pp. 142-152. o . D. Cook, A Method for Preparing and [28] E. K. Sittig and H. Bonding Ultrasonic Transducers in Frequency Used High ZEEE, (Lett.) Vol. 56, Aug. 1968. Dieit,al Delav Lines, PTOC. -1375-13j6. J. 129) g.C. H uang, J. D. Knox, Z . Turski, R. Wargo, and J. Hanak, Fabrication of Submicron LiNbO, Transducers for Microwave Acoustic-(Bulk) delay Lines, A p p l . Phys. Lett., Vol. 24, Feb. 1974, pp. 109-111. [30] D. Beecham, Sputter Mmhining of Piezoelectric Transducers, J . A p p l . Phys., Vol. 40, Oct. 1969, pp. 43574361. [31] D. M.Stevensonand J. J. Hanak, Low Loss, Broadband Microwave Ultrasonic Delay Lines Using Ion-Beam Milled Shear Wave Transducers,RCA Review, Vol. 35, Sept. 1974, pp. 355-371. [32] E. K. Sittig, Effects of Bonding and Electrode Layers on the Transmission Parameters of Piezoelectric Transducers Used in Ultrasonic Digital Delay Lines, ZEEE Trans. Sonics Ultrason., Vol. SU-16, Jan. 1969, p. 2-10. [33] A. H. Meitzler and E. Sittig, Characterization of Piezoelectric Transiucers IJsed in Ult,rasonic Devices Operating Above 0.1GHz., J . A p p l . Phys., Vol. 40, Oct. 1969, pp. 4341-4352. [34] T. M. Reeder and D. K. Winslow, Characteristics of Microwave Acoustic Transducers for Volume Wave Excitation, ZEEE Trans. Microwave Themu Tech., Vol. MTT-17, Nov. 1969, pp. 927-943; [35] G . L. Matthaei, Tahles of Chebyshev Impedance TransformingNetworks of Low-Pass FilterForm, Proc.ZEEE, Aug. 1964, pp. 939-963. [36] J. Randolph and J. Morrison, Modulation Transfer Characteristics of an Acousto-Opt!: Deflector, A p p l . Optics, Vol. 10, 1971, pp. 1383-1385. Rayleigh-Eqnivalent Resolution of A p p l . Optics, Vol. 10, 1971, Acousto-Optic Deflection Cells pp. 1453-1454. 1371 D. A. Pinnow, Acousto-Optic Light Deflection: Design Consideration for First Order Beam Steering Transducers, ZEEE Trans. Sonics Ultrason.,Vol. SIJ-18, Oct. 1971, pp. 209-214. [38] E. K. Sittig, Elasto-Optic Light Modulation and Deflection, in P T O U T ~ S S Zn Ontics Vol. X. Wolf. Ed.. North-Holland Puhlish, . ing Co. Amsterdam, 1972. [39] N. Uchida and Y. Ohmachi, Elastic and Phot,oelastic Properties of TeOz Single Crystal, J . A p p l . Phys., Vol. 40,Nov. 1969, pp. 4692-4695. [40] T. Yano and A. Watanabe, AcoustEOptic Figure of Merit of J . A p p l . Phys., Vol. 45, TeOl for CircularlyPolarizedLight, Mar. 1974, pp. 1243-1245. [41] A. W. Warner, D. L. White, and U. A. Ilonner, Acousto-Optic Light Deflectors Optical Using ActivityParatellurit.e, in J . A p p l . Phys., Vol. 43, Nov. 1972, pp. 44894495. [42] W. H. Watson arid R. Adler, Cascading Wide-Band AcoustoOptic Deflectors, I E E E Conf. Laser Engineering and Applications, Washington D. C. lune 1969. [43] I. C . Chang and D. L. Hecht.,DoublingAcousto-Optic Deflector Resolution Iltilizine Second Order Rirefrinecnt Diffraction, A p p l . Phys. Lett.,v$. 27, Nov. 1975. 144) R. W. Dixon and E. I. Gordon,Acoustic Light Modulators UsingOpticalHeterodyne Mixing, B.S.T.J., Vol. 46, Feb. 1967, pp. 367-389. [45] D. Maydan, Acousto-Optical Pulse Modulators, J . Quantum Eledron., Vol. QE-6, Jan. 1970, pp. 15-24. 1461 F. Okolicsanvi. The Wave-Slot. An OuticalTelevision Svs-, k m , Wirele&Enqr., Vol. 14, Oct.; 1937, p 527-536. [47] D, M. Robinson, The Supersonic Light 8ontroland its Appliiation to Television with Spatial Reference to the ScophonyTelevision Receiver, Proc. IRE, Vol. 27, Aug. 1939, pp. 483486. [ G ] S. E. Harris, S. T. K. Nieh, and D. K. Winslow, Electronically Tunable Acousto-%tic Filter., A m . Phus. Lett.. Vol. 15. Nov. 1969, pp. 325-326. [49] S.E. Harris, S. T. K. Nieh,andR. S. Feigelson,CaMoO, Electronically Tunable Optical Filter, A p p l . Phys. Lett., Vol. 17, Sept. 1970, pp. 223-225. 1501 S. T. K. Nieh and S. E. Harris, Aperture-Bandwidth Characteristics of Acousto-htic Filter. J . OD[.Soc. A m . . Vol. 62. May 1972, pp. 672476.

8.

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[51] J. A. Kusters, D. A. Wilson, and D. L . Hammontf, Optimum Crystal Orientation for Acoustically Tuned Opt,ic T%lt,ers, J . Opt. Soc. Am.,Vol. 64, Apr. 1974, pp. 434340. [52] I. C. Chang, Tunable Acousto-Oztic Filter IJtilizing Acoustic A p p l . Phys.Lett., Vol. 2 5 , Beam Walkoff inCrystalQuartz, Sept. 1974, pp. 323-324. [53] I. C.Chang,NoncollinearAcousto-OpticFilterwithLarge Angular Aperture, A p p l . Phys. Lett., Vol. 25, Oct. 1974, pp. 370-372. [54] J. D.Feichtner, M. Gottlieb,and J. J. Conroy, A Tunable Collinear AcousttrOpticFilt,er for t,he IntermediateInfrared Using Crystal TIAsSes, I E E E Conf. Laser Engineering and Applications, Washington D.C.,May 1975. [55] D. A. Pinnow, I,. G. Von IJitert, A. W . Warner, and W A. . Bonner, Lead Molybdate: A Melt-Grown CryPtal With a High Figure of MeritAcousto-Optic for Device Applications, A p p l . Phys. Lett., Vol. 15, Aug. 1969, pp, 83-86. [56] L. K. Anderson et al., An Experimental Read-onlyI-Iolographic Optical Memory, Sixtal Int. Quantum Electron. Conf., Kyot,o, Japan, Sept. 1970. . (571 I Gorog, J. D. Knox, antl P. V . Goedertier, A Television-Rate I. General Considerations, RCA Rev., Vol. Laser Scanner. 33, Dec. 1972, pp. 623-666. 1581 I. Gorog, J. D. Knox, P. V. Goedertier, and I. Shidlovsky A Television Laser Rat.e Scanner. 1 . Recent 1 .Dcvclopment,s, RCA Rev., Vol. 33, Dec. 1972, pp. 667-673. [59] G. Hrbek and W. Watson, A High Speed 1,aser Alphanumeric Generat,or, Electro-Optical System Design Conf., New York, Sept. 1970. [60] A. W. Warner and D. A. Pinnow, Miniature A4coust,o-Opt,ic Modulators for Optical Communications. . Quantum Electron., J Dec. Vol. &E-$], 1973, p 1155-1157. [61] R. L. Abramsand&..A. Pinnow, Efficient Acousto-Optic Modulator a t 3.39 and 10.6 Microseconds in Cryst,allinc Germanium, ZEEE J . QuantumElectron. (Corresp.), Vol. QE-7, Mar. 1971, pp. 135-136. 1621 I. C. Chang andG. Moradian, Frequency Modulat,etl AcoustoOptic bIoclulat.orsfor 10.6 pm 1,aser Comrnunicat,ions, ElectroOptics System Design Conf., San Fransisco, Nov. 1974. 1631 C. S. Tsai and S. K. Yao, Bragg Diffraction by Standing Ult,rasonic Waves With Application tlo Opt,ical Demult,iplexing, J . A p p l . Phys., Vol. 43, Dec. 1972, pp. 5081-5084. Intl Ekclron Dm. MedingTech.Digest, Washington, D. C . Dec. 1973, pp. 22Q-222. Rarnard, Ultrasonic-Re1641 A. J. Demaria, R. Gagosx,antlG. fraction Shut#ter for Optical Maser Oscillators,J . A p p l . Phys., Vol. 34, Mar. 1963, pp. 453-456. [65] L. E. Hargrove, R. J,. Fork, and M. A. Pollack,1,ocking of He-Ne I m e r Modes Induced hy Synchronous Intracnvit,y Modulation, A p p l . Phys. L e f t . , Vol. 5 , .July 1964, pp. 4-5. [66] D. Maydan, Fast Modulat,or for Ext.ract,ion of Int,ernal 1,ase.r Power, J . A p p l . Phys., Vol. 41, Mar. 1970, pp. 1552-15FiR. [67] R. B. Cheder, M. A. k a r r , and J. E. Geusic, An Experimrntal andTheoretical St,udy of High RrprtitionRat.e &)-Switched Nd:YAIG Lasers, Proc. ZEER, Vol. 58, Dec. 1970, pp. 18991914. [68] M. G.Cohen,ASimpleHighlyEfficjentAcousto-Optic QSwitch, I E E E Conf. Laser Engineermg antl Applicatio~~s, Washington, D. C. May, 3973. 1691 0. I . Wood, R. l,. Abrams, and T. J. Rritleq Mode 1,ocking t of a Transversely Excited Atmospheric Pressure COr A p p l . Phys. Lett., Vol. 17, Nov. 1970, pp. 376-37:; [70] I,. C.Foster, M. D.Ewy,andC. R. Crumlv, Laser Mode Locking by an External Doppler Cell, p p l . Phys. Lett., Vol. C,, A Jan. 196.5, pp. 6-8. [ i l l D. Maydan, Mirromachining and Image Recording on Thin Films by Laser Reams R.S.T.J., Vol. 50, July-August, 1971, pp. 1%-1789. R. H. Johnson, Characteristics of Acoust,n-Optir: Cavity Dumping in a Mode Locked Laser, J. Q~mntumElectron. (corresp.)), Vol. Q E 9 , Feh. 1973, pp. 2552.57. D. 6. Kuizenga, D. W . Phillion, T. Lund, antl A. E. Siegman, Simultaneous @Switching antl Mode Imcking in the C W Nd:YAG Laser, Optics. Comrn.. Vol. 9 , Nov. 1973, pp. 221-226. D. .J. Taylor, S.T. K. Neih, and T. W . Hansch,Electronic Tuning of a Dye Laser Using the Acousto-Opt,ic Filter, A p p l . Phys. Z,eLt., Vo. 19, Oct. 1971, pp, 269-271. M . B. Schulz, M . G. Holland, and 1,. Davis, ,Jr., Opl~ical Pulse CompressionIJsing Rragg Scat,tering hy Ult,rmonicWaves, A p p l . Phys. Lett., Vol. 11, Oct,. 1967, pp. 237-?f0. J. H. Collins, E. G. H. Lean, and H. J. Phaw, Pnlse Compression bv Bragg Diffraction of LightwithMicrowaveSound, A p p l . Phys. Lett., Vol. I I , Oct. 1967, p t . 242-242. M. P. Wenkoff and M. Katchkv. An Imuroved Reatl-In Technique For Opt,ical Delay T,ineCorrelat.ors,Applied O p f i c s , Vol. 9, Jan. 1970, pp. 135-147.
L m c b r ,

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SONICS ~ N D ULTRASONICS, VOL.

SW-23, NO. 1,

JANUARY

1976

[78]L. B. Lambert,Wide-Band,Instantaneous Spectrum An[81] D. L. Hecht,Acousto-OpticNonlinearities in Multi-Frequency IRE I n f . Acousto-Optic Diffraction, Tntl. Quantum Electron Conf., alyzers Em loying Delay-Line Modulators, Light San Francisco, June 1974. Conv. Rec., fit. 6, Vol. 10, Mar. 1962, pp. 69-78. [79] R. W. Damon, W. T. Maloney, and D. H. McMahon, Ink:; [82] A. J. DeMaria and G. E. Danielson, Internal Laser Modulation by AcousticLens-LikeEffects, IEEE J . Quantum Electron., and action of Light with Ultrasound: Phenomena Applicat,ions, in Physical AcousticsVol. VII, W. P. Mason and R. N. Thurston, Vol. QE-2, July 1966, pp. 157-164. York, 1970. (831 L. C. Foster, C. B. Cmmly, and R. L . Cohoon, A High ResoluEds., Academic New Press, tion Linear Optical Scanner llsing A Traveling Wave Acoustic [SO] D. L. Hecht, Broadband Acousto-Optic Spectrum Analyzers, Ultrasonics Symp., Monterey, Calif., Nov. 1973. Lens, Applied Optics, Vol. 9, Sept. 1970, pp. 2154-2160.

II. Acoustooptic Interactions Between Guided Optical Waves

and Acoustic Surface Waves
RONAJ,l) V. SCHMIDT

been reportcd [1]--[11], These deflectors arr analogous to bulk defl&ors. In thccase of the second type of deflector, which was first proposed by Chang [la], the acoustic surface wave deflects the incident guided light out of the waveguide int.0 an unguided optical beam called a radiation modr. 1 3 y varying the frequency of the sound wave, the angle a t which the light beam escapes from the waveguide j s changcd.This type of deflector has also been HERE HAS been a recent trend from bulk acoustic demonstrated [lS]. I n this paper we nil1 describe and compare the various and optical signal processing devices towards planar devices which respectively utilize acoustic surface waves planar acoustoopt,ic deflector configurations which have and guided optical waves. The motivation for considering h e n demonstmtrd. Also, the uniquefeatures of planar will be discussed. The complex planar devices of this type is usually improved perform- acoustooptic cleflectors nature of t,hc acoustic surface wave-guidcd opt(ica1wave ance, miniaturization, and the utilization of new dcvice techniques which are unique to the planar configuration. intrracttion due to nonuniform optical and acoustic field For these reasons i t is natural t o consider the acoustooptic dist8rihut,ionsxi11 be investigated so thatthe various interaction bet,ween acousticsurfacewaves and guided planar deflectors can he compared and simple guidelines optical waves for laser modulation and deflection. L lnce can he established for obtaining efficient interact,ions. 7 The acoustooptic interaction between acoustic surface Kuhn et al. [l] firstdemonstrated a n acousticsurface m v e s and guided optical w a v e differ from that o f bulk wave-guided optical wave deflector in 1970, a number of different deflector and modulatorconfigurabions have been deflectors primarily because of t,he conlplicated strain proposed and demonstrated. It is now clear that planar distributions of t,he acoustic surface wave and because of wave properties of the optical wave. The acoustoopticdevicescanbemademuchmore efficient the guided efficiency of an acoustic surface waveguided optical wave than their bulk counterparts because diffraction limits on interaction depends strongly on optical waveguidc proplong interaction length? and high-power density, present erties and the acoustic wavelength. I n order t o establish with bulk devices, are reduced for planar devices where the waves are confined t o the crystal surface. The planar some guidelines for a n efficient interaction and to define device also provides promise of greater transducer flexi- an acoustooptic figure of merit for planar deflectors, it is bility and more control over phase-matching requirements. necessary to discuss the interaction in detail and review Planar acoustooptic deflectors can be divided into two some basic propertiesof acoustic surfacewaves and guided types. In thecase of the first, type the incident, light beam optical waves. We will primarily consider a simplr isotropic and thedeflected light beam are both guided by theoptical slah optical waveguide illustrated in Fig. 1(a). It consists waveguide. Several versions of this type of deflector have of a substrate of index n,*,and a waveguide of thickness h a,nd index ?zJ. The cover index n, is taken to be that of free space, i.e., n., = 1. It is further assumed that substrate Manuscript received July 18, 1975. Nd and wavcguide form an isot,ropic homogeneous elastic Theauthor is withBellTelephoneLaboratories,Holmdel, 07733. solid. With this simple model it will be possible to illus-

Abskroct-Highly e5cient, large bandwidth acoustooptic deflectors have been demonstrated by using acoustic surface waves to Wract guided optical waves. The basic principlesthe acoustooptic of interaction between guided optical waves and acoustic surface wavesarereviewed.Deviceparameters of thin-film acoustooptic deflectors are discussed, and criteria are established for the efficiency of the various thin-film deflectors. Current experimental results are reviewed.