A high-power spectral beamsplitter for closely spaced frequencies

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.

8 pages, 4 figures