DESIGN OF SPATIAL LIGHT MODULATORS BASED ON HIGH TEMPERATURE SUPERCONDUCTORS

A SPATIAL LIGHT MODULATOR SENSITIVE IN THE INFRARED AND AT SAME TIME PROVIDING THE CAPABILITY OF MODULATING A LASER BEAM IN THE VISIBLE SHALL BE OF GREAT VALUE IN OPTICAL INFORMATION PROCESSING. THIS PROPOSAL DISCUSSES THE FEASIBILITY OF SUCH A DEVICE UTILIZING HIGH TRANSITION TEMPERATURE SUPERCONDUCTORS IN CONJUNCTION WITH A NONLINEAR OPTICAL MATERIAL. THE NONLINEARITY EXPLOITED FOR THESE DEVICES ARE FARADAY ROTATION AND THE COTTON-MOUTON EFFECT. THESE OPTICAL NONLINEARITIES ARE INDUCED BY A MAGNETIC FIELD. PHASE I OBJECTIVES INCLUDES THE DEVELOPMENT OF A MODEL FOR THE PROPOSED DEVICE, EXPERIMENTS TO TEST THE VALIDITY OF THE DEVICE PRINCIPLES, SURVEY AND IDENTIFICATION OF MATERIALS FOR BEST DEVICE PERFORMNCE AND PROPOSAL OF DEVICE CONFIGURATIONS. THE RESULTS OF PHASE I WILL PROVIDE THE FOUNDATION FOR PHASE II WORK.