Low-Finesse Fabry–Perot Cavity Design Based on a Reflective Sphere

Low-finesse Fabry–Perot (F–P) cavities, widely applied in the field of micro-displacement measurement, offer significant advantages in reducing the influence of higher-order reflections and improving the accuracy of measurement systems. Generally, an F–P cavity finesse of 0.5 is required to achieve...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ju Wang, Ye Gao, Jinlong Yu, Hao Luo, Xuemin Su, Xu Han, Yang Gao, Ben Cai, Chuang Ma
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2025-07-01
Series:Photonics
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Online Access:https://www.mdpi.com/2304-6732/12/7/723
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Summary:Low-finesse Fabry–Perot (F–P) cavities, widely applied in the field of micro-displacement measurement, offer significant advantages in reducing the influence of higher-order reflections and improving the accuracy of measurement systems. Generally, an F–P cavity finesse of 0.5 is required to achieve high-precision micro-displacement measurements. However, in optical design, low-finesse cavities impose strict requirements on reflectivity, and maintaining fine stability during cavity movement is challenging. Achieving ideal orthogonal interference with a finesse of 0.5 thus presents considerable difficulties. This study proposes a novel low-finesse F–P cavity design that employs a high-reflectivity spherical reflector and the end face of a fiber collimator as the reflective surfaces of the cavity. By utilizing beam divergence characteristics and geometric parameters, a structure with a finesse of approximately 0.5 is quantitatively designed, enabling a simplified implementation without the need for angular alignment. Compared with conventional approaches, this method eliminates the need for precise angular alignment of the reflective surfaces, significantly simplifying implementation. The experimental results show that, under fixed receiving field angles and beam radii of the fiber collimators, ideal orthogonal interference can be achieved by selecting the radius of the reflective sphere. Under varying working distances, the average finesse values of the interference spectra measured by Collimators 1 and 2 are 0.496 and 0.502, respectively, both close to the theoretical design value of 0.5, thereby meeting the design requirements.
ISSN:2304-6732