Abstract

Reconfigurability, efficiency, and angular and wavelength selectivities of optical grating holograms have been the subjects of several recent studies. Wu et al.¹ have studied the properties of volume holograms vis-a-vis angular and wavelength selectivities and wavelength tunability for relatively small angular deviations from the Bragg angle. Their work emphasizes reconfiguration of an optical interconnection network for an array of photorefractive holograms. Recently, a general formalism was developed for Bragg-domain acousto-optic diffraction of arbitrary-profile optical beams using a straightforward inverse Fourier integral² involving a so-called plane-wave transfer function for a particular scattered order of light. The formalism was applied to the case of a Gaussian-profile beam for which both numerical and asymptotic analytical solutions were obtained. It was, however, restricted to the typically small (a few milliradians) Bragg angles characteristic of acousto-optic interactions. Recently, the above work has been extended to include both arbitrary beam profiles and Bragg angles for holographic gratings, which may be tilted or untilted.³ This paper concentrates on a direct application of the above modified formalism to the study of the selectivity and tunability of grating holograms.

© 1992 Optical Society of America