Plano-Convex Rectangular Cylindrical Lenses

A cylindrical lens is a lens that focuses light on a line instead of a point, like a spherical lens. The curved face or faces of a cylindrical lens are sections of a cylinder, and focus the image passing through it into a line parallel to the intersection of the surface of the lens and a plane tangent to it. The lens compresses the image in the direction perpendicular to this line and leaves it unaltered in the direction parallel to it (in the tangent plane). In a light sheet microscope, a cylindrical lens is placed in front of the illumination objective to create the light sheet used for imaging. Cylindrical lenses focus or expand light in one axis only. They can be used to focus light into a thin line in optical metrology, laser scanning, spectroscopic, laser diode, acousto-optic, and optical processor applications. They can also be used to expand the output of a laser diode into a symmetrical beam. Cylindrical lenses are widely used in telecom applications like WSS, 40G/100G modules and laser applications like pump laser modules

Plano-concave rectangular cylindrical lenses provide uni- axial negative imaging for anamorphic beam expansion and a wide range of applications.These lenses may also be used as mirror blanks if a concave cylindrical surface mirror is required.

Plano-convex circular cylindrical lenses are useful for line imaging or uni-axial magnification in a wide range of applications. These lenses may be combined with other lenses to form complex imaging systems.

Invented by H.W. Dove, Dove Prisms are also known Reversion prisms.  When the prism is rotated about its length axis, the image viewed through the prism rotates at twice the prism rotation rate.  This is an unusual and sometimes useful property for special applications. Entry and exit faces are anti-reflection coated.

HGO grows Tm:YLF laser crystals using Czochralski technology. Tm:YLF is an important middle infrared laser crystal. Because Tm:YLF is negative uniaxial crystal, whose thermal refractive index coefficient is negative, some thermal distortion may be counteracted and high-quality light can be output. Conveniently pumped at 792nm, 1.9μm linearly polarized beam is output in a axis, and non-linearly polarized beam is output in c axis. The YLF crystals has low non-linear refraction index value and thermo optical constants, which makes these crystals applicable in research, development, education, production, photonics, optic, laser technology and telecommunications. Besides, Tm3+:YLF lasers are ideal pump sources for 2.1 μm Ho3+:YAG lasers. This is due to a good overlap of Tm3+:YLF emission and Ho3+:YAG absorption spectra and the capacity of producing linearly polarized output. What is more, the refractive index of Tm3+:YLF decreases with temperature, leading to a negative thermal lens that is partly compensated by a positive lens effect due to end face bulging.

Waveplates (retardation plates or phase shifters) are made from materials which exhibit birefringence. The velocities of the extraordinary and ordinary rays through the birefringent material varies inversely with their refractive indices. This difference in velocities gives rise to a phase difference when the two beams recombine.

A band pass filter is a device that passes frequencies within a certain range and rejects (attenuates) frequencies outside that range, and it’s used to selectively transmit a portion of the spectrum while rejecting all other wavelengths.

Co2+:MgAl2O4 Cospinel is a relatively new material for passive Q-switching in lasers emitting from 1.2 to 1.6 μm, in particular, for eye-safe 1.54 μm Er:glass laser, but also works at 1.44 μm and 1.34 μm wavelengths. Spinel is a hard, stable crystal that polishes well. Cobalt substitutes readily for magnesium in the Spinel host without the need for additional charge compensation ions. High absorption cross section (3.5×10-19 cm2) permits Q-switching of Er:glass laser without intracavity focusing both with flash-lamp and diode-laser pumping. Negligible excited-state absorption results in high contrast of Q-switch, i.e. the ratio of initial (small signal) to saturated absorption is higher than 10.