A broad-angle polarization beam splitter based on a simple dielectric periodic structure

We propose a novel broad-angle polarization beam splitter utilizing the spatial dispersion of a special multi-layered dielectric periodic structure. The equal-frequency contours of this structure are flat lines for TE polarization but curved lines for TM polarization at a designed frequency. This special multi-layered structure has a fixed optical thickness for TE polarization for all incident angles. A polarization beam splitter working over a broad range of angle (from 0 degrees to 70 degrees) is achieved by stacking two such multi-layered structures of finite length (in the normal direction) with a half-period shift in the transverse direction. (C) 2007 Optical Society of America.