Shaopu Wang

Virtual interferometer calibration method of a non-null interferometer for freeform surface measurements.

Non-null interferometry is a prospective method for aspheric and freeform surface measurements because of its potential versatility over null interferometry. Due to the existence of the retrace error, non-null testing usually has the drawbacks of low accuracy and inconvenient alignment of the surface under test (SUT). In this paper, a calibration method for freeform SUT in a non-null interferometer is introduced. This method calibrates the position and attitude of the SUT in a virtual interferometer with an optimization algorithm, and no accurate adjustment mechanism is required to adjust the SUT in the real interferometer. An application of this method in the digital moiré interferometric technique (DMIT) is presented. The retrace error and the influence of the alignment error can be removed after calibration. Experimental results indicate that with this calibration method, the DMIT can achieve a measurement repeatability of λ/20 (PV) when the freeform SUT has obvious alignment error. This is adequate for most aspheric and freeform surface measurements, especially when the vibration cannot be isolated completely and the freeform SUT is not easy to align.

Convex Aspherical Surface Testing Using Catadioptric Partial Compensating System

Aspheric optical components are the indispensable part of modern optics systems. With the constant development of aspheric optical fabrication technique, the systems with large aperture convex aspheric optical components are widely used in astronomy and space optics. Thus, the measurement of the figure error of the whole convex aspherical surface with high precision comes to be a challenge in the area of optical surface manufacture, and surface testing method is also very important. This paper presents a new partial compensating system by the combination of a refractive lens and a reflective mirror for testing convex aspherical surface. The refractive lens is used to compensate the aberration of the tested convex asphere partially. The reflective mirror is a spherical mirror which is coaxial to the refractive lens and reflecting the lights reflected by the tested convex asphere back to the convex asphere itself. With the long focal length and large aperture system we can realize a lighter and more compact system than the refractive partial compensating system because the spheric reflective mirror is more easily to realize and can bending the light conveniently.

Partial compensation interferometry measurement system for parameter errors of conicoid surface

Surface parameters, such as vertex radius of curvature and conic constant, are used to describe the shape of an aspheric surface. Surface parameter errors (SPEs) are deviations affecting the optical characteristics of an aspheric surface. Precise measurement of SPEs is critical in the evaluation of optical surfaces. In this paper, a partial compensation interferometry measurement system for SPE of a conicoid surface is proposed based on the theory of slope asphericity and the best compensation distance. The system is developed to measure the SPE-caused best compensation distance change and SPE-caused surface shape change and then calculate the SPEs with the iteration algorithm for accuracy improvement. Experimental results indicate that the average relative measurement accuracy of the proposed system could be better than 0.02% for the vertex radius of curvature error and 2% for the conic constant error.

Vertex radius of curvature error measurement of aspheric surface based on slope asphericity in partial compensation interferometry

Vertex radius of curvature (VROC) is an important shape parameter used to determine the properties of an optical aspheric surface. Precise measurement of VROC error is critical for manufacturing and aligning optical aspheric surfaces. This paper introduces VROC error measurement of aspheric surface by using slope asphericity with partial compensation interferometry. VROC error and the decoupled surface figure error (SFE) can be simultaneously measured. Experimental results indicate that the method exhibits relative measurement accuracy of 0.01% when the nominal VROC is 889 mm, and the decoupled SFE error is λ/10 of the peak-to-valley value.

Calibration of misalignment errors in the non-null interferometry based on reverse iteration optimization algorithm

With no necessity of compensating the whole aberration introduced by the aspheric surfaces, non-null test has the advantage over null test in applicability. However, retrace error, which is brought by the path difference between the rays reflected from the surface under test (SUT) and the incident rays, is introduced into the measurement and makes up of the residual wavefront aberrations (RWAs) along with surface figure error (SFE), misalignment error and other influences. Being difficult to separate from RWAs, the misalignment error may remain after measurement and it is hard to identify whether it is removed or not. It is a primary task to study the removal of misalignment error. A brief demonstration of digital Moiré interferometric technique is presented and a calibration method for misalignment error on the basis of reverse iteration optimization (RIO) algorithm in non-null test method is addressed. The proposed method operates mostly in the virtual system, and requires no accurate adjustment in the real interferometer, which is of significant advantage in reducing the errors brought by repeating complicated manual adjustment, furthermore improving the accuracy of the aspheric surface test. Simulation verification is done in this paper. The calibration accuracy of the position and attitude can achieve at least a magnitude of 10-5 mm and 0.0056×10-6rad, respectively. The simulation demonstrates that the influence of misalignment error can be precisely calculated and removed after calibration.

Measurement of steep aspheric surfaces using improved two-wavelength phase-shifting interferometer

Optical components with aspheric surfaces can improve the imaging quality of optical systems, and also provide extra advantages such as lighter weight, smaller volume and simper structure. In order to satisfy these performance requirements, the surface error of aspheric surfaces, especially high departure aspheric surfaces must be measured accurately and conveniently. The major obstacle of traditional null-interferometry for aspheric surface under test is that specific and complex null optics need to be designed to fully compensate for the normal aberration of the aspheric surface under test. However, non-null interferometry partially compensating for the aspheric normal aberration can test aspheric surfaces without specific null optics. In this work, a novel non-null test approach of measuring the deviation between aspheric surfaces and the best reference sphere by using improved two-wavelength phase shifting interferometer is described. With the help of the calibration based on reverse iteration optimization, we can effectively remove the retrace error and thus improve the accuracy. Simulation results demonstrate that this method can measure the aspheric surface with the departure of over tens of microns from the best reference sphere, which introduces approximately 500λ of wavefront aberration at the detector.

Digital Moiré based transient interferometry and its application in optical surface measurement

Digital Moiré based transient interferometry (DMTI) is an effective non-contact testing methods for optical surfaces. In DMTI system, only one frame of real interferogram is experimentally captured for the transient measurement of the surface under test (SUT). When combined with partial compensation interferometry (PCI), DMTI is especially appropriate for the measurement of aspheres with large apertures, large asphericity or different surface parameters. Residual wavefront is allowed in PCI, so the same partial compensator can be applied to the detection of multiple SUTs. Excessive residual wavefront aberration results in spectrum aliasing, and the dynamic range of DMTI is limited. In order to solve this problem, a method based on wavelet transform is proposed to extract phase from the fringe pattern with spectrum aliasing. Results of simulation demonstrate the validity of this method. The dynamic range of Digital Moiré technology is effectively expanded, which makes DMTI prospective in surface figure error measurement for intelligent fabrication of aspheric surfaces.

Design of optoelectronic imaging system with high resolution and large field-of-view based on dual CMOS

With the advantages of high resolution, large field of view and compacted size, optoelectronic imaging sensors are widely used in many fields, such as robot’s navigation, industrial measurement and remote sensing. Many researchers pay more attention to improve the comprehensive performances of imaging sensors, including large field of view (FOV), high resolution, compact size and high imaging efficiency, etc. One challenge is the tradeoff between high resolution and large field of view simultaneously considering compacted size. In this paper, we propose an optoelectronic imaging system combining the lenses of short focal length and long focal length based on dual CMOS to simulate the characters of human eyes which observe object within large FOV in high resolution. We design and optimize the two lens, the lens of short focal length is used to search object in a wide field and the long one is responsible for high resolution imaging of the target area. Based on a micro-CMOS imaging sensor with low voltage differential transmission technology-MIPI (Mobile Industry Processor Interface), we design the corresponding circuits to realize collecting optical information with high speed. The advantage of the interface is to help decreasing power consumption, improving transmission efficiency and achieving compacted size of imaging sensor. Meanwhile, we carried out simulations and experiments to testify the optoelectronic imaging system. The results show that the proposed method is helpful to improve the comprehensive performances of optoelectronic imaging sensors.

Software system design for the non-null digital Moiré interferometer

Aspheric optical components are an indispensable part of modern optics systems. With the development of aspheric optical elements fabrication technique, high-precision figure error test method of aspheric surfaces is a quite urgent issue now. We proposed a digital Moiré interferometer technique (DMIT) based on partial compensation principle for aspheric and freeform surface measurement. Different from traditional interferometer, DMIT consists of a real and a virtual interferometer. The virtual interferometer is simulated with Zemax software to perform phase-shifting and alignment. We can get the results by a series of calculation with the real interferogram and virtual interferograms generated by computer. DMIT requires a specific, reliable software system to ensure its normal work. Image acquisition and data processing are two important parts in this system. And it is also a challenge to realize the connection between the real and virtual interferometer. In this paper, we present a software system design for DMIT with friendly user interface and robust data processing features, enabling us to acquire the figure error of the measured asphere. We choose Visual C++ as the software development platform and control the ideal interferometer by using hybrid programming with Zemax. After image acquisition and data transmission, the system calls image processing algorithms written with Matlab to calculate the figure error of the measured asphere. We test the software system experimentally. In the experiment, we realize the measurement of an aspheric surface and prove the feasibility of the software system.

Non-null compensator design method in digital Moiré interferometry for freeform surface measurement

High accuracy interferometric testing for freeform optics surface has always been a great challenge because of its arbitrary form. Our group proposed a Digital Moiré Interferometric Technique (DMIT) based on partial compensator (PC) for aspheric surface testing since the year 2003. But the PC design method for non-rotational symmetric freeform surface is still a challenge. In this paper, we propose a PC design method for non-null freeform surface measurement. The PC generates non-rotational symmetry aberration by off axis and rotation round axis. Later the design criterion of PC is also analyzed. Finally an off-axis aspheric surface was measured in the simulation experiment, and the error of PV and RMS is 0.0053λ and 0.0498λ theoretically. Experimental results indicate that the designed PC is able to be utilized in freeform surface measurement.