Item

Abstract

The homogeneity test of glass plates in a Fizeau interferometer is hampered by the superposition of multiple interference signals coming from the surfaces of the glass plate as well as the empty Fizeau cavity. To evaluate interferograms resulting from such nested cavities, various approaches such as the use of broadband light sources have been applied. In this paper, we propose an adaptive frequency comb interferometer to accomplish the cavity selection. An adjustable Fabry-Perot resonator is used to generate a variable frequency comb that can be matched to the length of the desired cavity. Owing to its flexibility, the number of measurements needed for the homogeneity test can be reduced to four. Furthermore, compared to approaches using a two-beam interferometer as a filter for the broadband light source, the visibility of the fringe system is considerably higher if a Fabry-Perot filter is applied. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America