Patent ID: 6014245
Filing Date: 2000-01-11
Classification: G02F

Abstract:
A non-collinear type acousto-optic tunable filter system comprising:a crystal body formed of an optically transparent uniaxial crystal material;an acoustic wave application member that applies an acoustic wave to an acoustic wave input surface of said crystal body; anda light source which radiates a source light beam incident on said crystal body such that the source light beam intersects an acoustic wave propagating within said crystal body so that acoustic frequency wavelength components of an incident ordinary ray and an incident extraordinary ray are diffracted within said crystal body, and are respectively separated into a monochromatic diffracted extraordinary ray and a monochromatic diffracted ordinary ray, said light source radiating said source light beam to have a predetermined receiving angular aperture which is off-perpendicularly incident on the surface of said crystal body at a predetermined source light incident angle between 0.degree. and 90.degree., where the source light incident angle is defined as the angle between the crystal surface normal and the optic axis of the source light beam.