Abstract

A search for new electrooptical (EO) materials having large EO coefficients and wide-band IR transmission was undertaken to expand the capabilities of the Hughes family of electrooptical tunable filters (EOTFs).¹ Although many approaches are possible, they typically involve ionic substitution within known crystal structures or families which have demonstrated the EO effect. We investigated structural analogs of compounds, e.g., LiNbO₃, which are known to have large EO coefficients; LiNbO₃ has an r₄₁ = 32 pm/V. The overall search is limited primarily to point groups which include noncentrosymmetric crystals. Our study emphasized far-IR transmitting materials with optical properties applicable to our longitudinal-mode electrooptic tunable filter (LEQTF).

© 1985 Optical Society of America