Patent ID: 6940647

Claim:
An optical processing system, comprising: a light pipe operable to communicate at least a portion of an optical signal for processing, the optical signal comprising a plurality of wavelengths; a first beam splitter operable to divide the optical signal into at least a first part and a second part, the first part of the optical signal having an input state of polarization; an optical signal separator operable to receive at least the first part of the optical signal and to communicate at least a portion of the first part to a polarization adjustment device for processing, the polarization adjustment device comprising: a first polarization beam splitter operable to receive the at least a portion of the first part of the optical signal and to separate the at least a portion of the first part of the optical signal into a first and a second principal mode of polarization; and at least three stages of phase shifters each operable to introduce a phase shift between the first and second principal modes, at least one phase shifter comprising a second beam splitter that is shared with at least one other of the phase shifters, the at least three stages of phase shifters comprising a first stage coupled to the first polarization beam splitter and a second stage coupled to a second polarization beam splitter, wherein the second beam splitter that is shared comprises a partially transmitting mirror; a combiner operable to combine one or more phase shifted portions of the first part of the optical signal into a phase shifted output signal; and an optical reflector operable to receive at least some of the phase shifted optical signal and to communicate the phase shifted optical signal to an output.