Abstract

A diffraction mechanism, and an optical model to reflect that mechanism, for a light-diffusing film with an alternate-polymer-layer structure was proposed and validated. According to this model, the film forms an angular distribution of light intensity that is almost constant in a certain scattering-angle (cutoff angle) range and drastically decreases outside that range; that is, the profile is similar to a trapezoid. Although the trapezoid intensity distribution (TID) is a fundamental distribution of the film, the mechanism to form the TID has not previously been clarified. A key mechanism is that the refractive-index distribution of the layer structure is expressed as stacked phase gratings, some of which should diffract zeroth-order light to higher orders strongly, and the repetition of this multiple diffraction spreads light over the whole cutoff angle range, thereby generating the TID. To verify the proposed mechanism, intensity distributions were calculated by using the proposed model. The calculation results indicate that the proposed model reproduces the TID.

© 2017 Optical Society of America

Tunable resonance-domain diffraction gratings based on electrostrictive polymers

Ramon Axelrod, Yosi Shacham-Diamand, and Michael A. Golub
Appl. Opt. 56(7) 1817-1825 (2017)

Optical elements containing semitransparent wavelike films

Anatoly M. Smolovich and Valery Chernov
Appl. Opt. 56(22) 6146-6155 (2017)

High-efficiency, high-dispersion diffraction gratings based on total internal reflection

John R. Marciante and Daniel H. Raguin
Opt. Lett. 29(6) 542-544 (2004)

Flexible diffractive gratings: theoretical investigation of the dependency of diffraction efficiency on mechanical deformation

Benjamin Ryba, Erik Förster, and Robert Brunner
Appl. Opt. 53(7) 1381-1387 (2014)

Homogeneous layer models for high-spatial-frequency dielectric surface-relief gratings: conical diffraction and antireflection designs

David L. Brundrett, Elias N. Glytsis, and Thomas K. Gaylord
Appl. Opt. 33(13) 2695-2706 (1994)