Polarization combining...without limit?

[planters]

I have been reading about these geometric holographic polarizers. They appear to CONVERT unpolarized light to polarized light. This is not the same as SEPARATING light into two orthogonal polarizations. The intriguing scenario is that you take two diodes and PBS combine them to achieve twice the power. You then send these two beams through one of these polarizers and obtain, again, two polarized beams. Rotate one relative to the other and repeat...and repeat.

http://www.imagineoptix.com/solution...on-system-pcs/

[andy_con]

I'm game for a sample

[swamidog]

I have been reading about these geometric holographic polarizers. They appear to CONVERT unpolarized light to polarized light. This is not the same as SEPARATING light into two orthogonal polarizations. The intriguing scenario is that you take two diodes and PBS combine them to achieve twice the power. You then send these two beams through one of these polarizers and obtain, again, two polarized beams. Rotate one relative to the other and repeat...and repeat.

http://www.imagineoptix.com/solution...on-system-pcs/

well, that's an interesting thing.. i would be very happy if knife edging became obsolete.

[CDBEAM]

Wait...Cheat the Optics Gods ????.....repeat over and over....for a perfect overlay ??? Nahhhh....Is this possible ???? Energy density off the chart !!! " What hath God wrought " ??????? Mr.P...Please do blaze the trail !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.....Many will be watching !!!
.
I agree with SD....to see knife edging go the way of the Dodo Bird would be a happy day indeed !!
I am in for a sample. Let's roll !!
.
CDBEAM=======>

[planters]

I'll contact them on Monday. Looking for orthogonal polarization in the red waveband. Presumably some of their inefficiency will be due to a completely non-polarized input beam. There will be no free lunch due to thermodynamic consequences of decreasing the entropy of the beam's polarization. But here, the application will be to "straighten out" a specific orthogonal polarization. This might be more or less favorable than a random input polarization.

[logsquared]

Take a look at the PDF:http://www.imagineoptix.com/wp-conte...e-101211v4.pdf

Unfortunately, it looks like they use a "louvered" alternating stack of retarders to align the orthogonality polarized "stacked" input beams. I dont think it would work on a laser beam. At least not to overlap them.

Hopefully I am wrong.

[catalanjo]

.....There will be no free lunch due to thermodynamic consequences of decreasing the entropy of the beam's polarization. ..........

Sounds to me like an "increased divergence" will be the tradeoff!
But very interested in practical results !
Cheers

[planters]

logsqoared,
I think you are correct. Your post lead me to research this in some detail. I discovered that there are numerous papers describing this "louvered" technique. I also have searched for what I had at first thought this would do... align the electric fields of the two beams by selectively rotating one of the beams to match the other. This seems like it would be possible. Basically, this would require a material that did not interact with an electric field that aligned with its crystal orientation but induced a rotation in the orthogonal direction. But, no luck.