High-power spectral beamsplitter for closely spaced frequencies

Opt Express. 2020 Apr 13;28(8):11372-11379. doi: 10.1364/OE.390956.

Abstract

An experimental realization of a compact, high-power spectral beamsplitter for nearly equal frequencies and identical polarization based on two-beam interference in a free-space Mach-Zehnder interferometer is presented. We demonstrate the power- and cost-efficient generation and subsequent spatial separation of two laser tones from a single sum-frequency-generation stage using double-sideband suppressed-carrier modulation in the infrared, and beam splitting in the visible at high power. The interferometer spectrally splits >98 % of the incident power when accounting for bulk absorption. The beamsplitter can be constructed identically for any power or spectral range required for which suitable optics are available.