English

Mitigation of the spectral dependent polarization angle response for achromatic half-wave plate

Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics 2014-04-24 v1 Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics

Abstract

Polarimetry using a half-wave plate (HWP) modulator provides the strong tools to avoid a detector 1/f noise and instrument-originated spurious polarization systematic effects. While the Pancharatnam achromatic HWP (AHWP) is commonly used for an application that needs a broadband frequency coverage, this technique introduces a frequency-dependent polarization angle rotation. In this paper we propose a new technique to mitigate this effect by introducing a second set of an AHWP. One rotational and one stationary set of AHWPs achieve a broadband coverage of modulation efficiency without the frequency-dependent polarization angle rotation. We conducted measurements by using three layers of sapphire wave plates and demonstrated this technique at millimeter wavelengths between 72 and 162 GHz. We also discuss a potential application in the CMB polarization experiment based on numerical simulations.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1404.5795,
  title  = {Mitigation of the spectral dependent polarization angle response for achromatic half-wave plate},
  author = {Tomotake Matsumura},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1404.5795},
  year   = {2014}
}

Comments

8 pages, 7 figures