Physics 305RN

Spring 2011 Lecture 4

Making a White Light Hologram in Lab

Reference and
Object Beams
come from
opposite sides
of plate

Mirror
Spatial
Filter

Laser
Film/
Plate

Object
Beam

Object

Reference and
Object Beams
come from
same side of
plate
Spatial
Filter

Reference
Beam
30-53 degrees

Blocks
Table

Green
Safelight

Making a Transmission Hologram

Laser

Emulsion
Side
towards
object

Green
Safelight
Film

Reference
Object
Beam
Beam
Object

Emulsion
Side
down

Interference of Object and Reference

The mirrors in hologram form at the locations of the bright/intense
fringes of the interference between the reference and object beams.

Vise
Table

Temporal Coherence
What if the phase relationship between the wavefronts
changes during the exposure?
The fringe
pattern is
washed out
and no
hologram is
recorded!

Reference
Beam

Bright
Fringe
Dark
Fringe
Fringe
Pattern

Object
Beam

Temporal Coherence

Temporal Coherence

Two temporally coherent waves

Two temporally coherent waves

If the waves are in-phase at some point and time, they always add constructively.

If the waves are in-phase at some point and time, they always add constructively.
If the waves are 180o out-of-phase at some point and time, they always add destructively.

Temporal Coherence

Temporal Coherence

Consider the addition of two waves with slightly different

frequencies/wavelengths

Who cares if intense parts are fluctuating on and off.

But dark areas are also oscillating between dark and bright,
and everything gets exposed to light and washes out on average.

The waves go from in-phase to out-of-phase to in-phase

at a rate equal to the difference between frequencies.
beats between waves of different frequencies

That is why we use one single frequency laser to form both the
object and reference beams when making a hologram.

Temporal Coherence

Temporal Coherence

Consider two waves with identical frequencies/wavelengths, but

with phase hic-cups between them.

What happens to dark fringes if lasers phase hic-cups

The dark fringes turn bright

The bright fringes go dark

If the phase between waves suddenly flips by 1800,
the waves go from in-phase to 1800 out-of-phase and
addition goes from constructive to destructive.
Slow beats between waves of different frequencies

If the phase suddenly flips by 1800,

the waves go from 1800 out-of-phase to in-phase and
addition goes from destructive to constructive.
Slow beats between waves of different frequencies

Making a Transmission Hologram

Green
Safelight

Temporal Coherence
Assume a pair of stars coming out of laser now represents the
instantaneous phase of the light wave,
but that the phase varies as the pairs come out of laser.

Film
Spatial
Filter
Laser

Laser
Object

Vise
Table

The interference at film

depends on the interference Object
of the laser with a delayed
version of laser.
Path difference is important.

Film

Temporal Coherence

Temporal Coherence

If there is no delay between two beams

from a laser with hiccups. . .

How do we measure temporal coherenece?

Coherence Time/Length
The coherence time is the average time between
laser frequency/phase hiccups.
The coherence length is the average distance travel by beam
between laser frequency/phase hiccups.
The coherence length = coherence time * speed of light.
The coherence length is roughly the maximum path difference
two beams can have and still be coherent.

Path Difference=0

Coherence Length

If path difference is zero, the waves add constructively, as they

are always in phase with each other.

Temporal Coherence

Temporal Coherence

Two beams from one laser with a

long coherence length and short path difference.

Two beams from one laser with a

long coherence length and short path difference.

Path Difference

Coherence Length

Path Difference

Coherence Length

Coherence Length

Likewise, dark fringe arent quite as dark, but still pretty dark.

Temporal Coherence

Temporal Coherence

So what happens with if coherence length is

equal to or less than the path difference.

Even if there are multiple hiccups during exposure. . .

Coherence Length

If path difference is much less than coherence length,

the two beams are soon back in-phase with each other.
Bright fringes are not quite as bright, but still bright.

Path Difference

Coherence Length

If path difference is much less than coherence length,

the percentage of time with mismatched phases is small.
Bright fringes stay quite bright, dark fringes stay fairly dark.

Path Difference

Coherence Length

If path difference is greater than or equal to coherence length,

the percentage of time with mismatched phases is large.
Remember that every time a bright fringe goes dark,
the dark fringe goes bright. Fringe pattern is destroyed!

Making a Transmission Hologram

Vibrations and Movement

Now assume our laser is temporally coherent
(i.e. no hiccups => very long coherence length)

Green
Safelight

The stars represent the crests of the wave emerging from the laser.
They are evenly spaced for a temporally coherent laser.
Film

Film
Spatial
Filter
Laser

Vise

Object

Object
Table

The beams meet at a point on the film, with a

path difference of one wavelength (in phase).

Vibrations and Movement

Vibrations and Movement

What if the object moves?!!?!?!?!?!

What if the object moves?!!?!?!?!?!

Film

Object movement only needs to change the path length by half

a wavelength to now have the two beams meet 180 degrees outof-phase from the phase relation before it moved.

Film

/2
Object

Object

To make good holograms you need both laser temporal coherence

and temporal coherence of the object.

Object Temporal Coherence

Now we lets reconsider the concept of target movement on
the fringe pattern throughout the film.

What is object
moves half a
wavelength
closer to film?

When the spatially

coherent
wavefronts meet,
they form regularly
spaced fringes.

Temporal Coherence
Temporal coherent is a relative term.
1) What if the phase relationship between the wavefronts
changes half way during a 30 second exposure of the film?
Temporally incoherent.
2) What if the wave front were constant over the 30 second
exposure time of the film, but changed after 1 minute?
Temporally coherent.
3) The same as 2), but what if we now increase the exposure
time to two minutes?
Temporally incoherent.

Spatial Coherence
Now we lets reconsider the concept of spatial coherence.

When the spatially

coherent
wavefronts meet,
they form regularly
spaced fringes.

Spatial Coherence
Now what if one of the beams is spatially incoherent.
Here the plane
wave doesnt have a
nice flat wavefront,
but instead has a
spatially structured
wavefront, and the
fringes formed are
spatially complex.

If an identically structured wavefront illuminates the film. . .

Spatial Coherence

Rays of light reflecting off the complex mirrors will still

appear to be from the point source.
BUT WHERE ARE WE GOING TO FIND TWO
IDENTICALLY COMPLEX WAVEFRONTS?!?!?!?!?!?!

Film
After the beams are
removed and the film is
developed, a complex
mirror structure is
permanently formed in
the film.

It is not easy to reproduce random things.

Spatial Filtering
Complex wavefronts are hard to duplicate.
But, by spatially filtering, we can easily produce (and reproduce)
spatially coherent spherical and plane waves.
Lens
Pinhole

The pinhole helps to clean up spatially incoherent wavefront

and produce a spatially coherent spherical wave (before lens)
or spatially coherent plane wave
(after lens)
st

Holo lab 1 gen laser with and without pinhole