English

A self-calibrating polarimeter to measure Stokes parameters

Instrumentation and Detectors 2021-02-22 v3 Optics

Abstract

An easily constructed and operated polarimeter precisely determines the relative Stokes parameters that characterize the polarization of laser light. The polarimeter is calibrated in situ without removing or realigning its optical elements, and it is largely immune to fluctuations in the laser beam intensity. The polarimeter's usefulness is illustrated by measuring thermally-induced birefringence in the indium-tin-oxide coated glass field plates used to produce a static electric field in the ACME collaboration's measurement of the electron electric dipole moment.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1703.00963,
  title  = {A self-calibrating polarimeter to measure Stokes parameters},
  author = {V. Wirthl and C. D. Panda and P. W. Hess and B. Spaun and G. Gabrielse},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1703.00963},
  year   = {2021}
}

Comments

In the updated version the typos in Eq. (12) and Eq. (22) were corrected. A brief note is added that Eq (12) is given up to a constant factor

R2 v1 2026-06-22T18:34:10.408Z