Patent ID: 7471378

Claim:
A method for determining a polarization dependent characteristic of a device comprising: a) receiving Mueller matrix data, the Mueller matrix data being indicative of wavelength dependent first row Mueller matrix elements of the device, the device being one of an optical and an opto-electrical device; b) using the Mueller matrix data, determining a matrix M corresponding to a difference between a first and a second transmission spectrum, the first and the second transmission spectrum corresponding to a first Stokes vector and a second Stokes vector, respectively, with the second Stokes vector being opposite to the first Stokes vector; c) determining eigenvalues of the matrix M; d) determining the first Stokes vector by selecting the largest eigenvalue of the matrix M and determining a corresponding eigenvector; e) determining the second Stokes vector, the second Stokes vector being a vector opposite to the eigenvector; and, f) determining data indicative of the polarization dependent characteristic of the device using the first and second Stokes vector and the Mueller matrix data.