Fabry-Perot (FP) interferometers are routinely used to measure upper atmospheric wind velocities, temperature differences, and weak emissions from astronomical objects. For a given wavelength, etalon plate spacing, and index of refraction of medium between the plates, the output is an interference pattern of concentric rings. The conventional method utilizes only the central portion of the Airy-disk pattern. Theoretically each ring carries the same light intensity; therefore it is obvious that the throughput of the system will increase dramatically if one utilizes many rings. Conventional ways of using multiple annular apertures or multiple detectors and thick focusing lens do not offer any extra benefits. A holographic optical element (HOE) will be developed to replace the lens, aperture, and filter in a FP interferometer. The new HOE is expected to enhance performance dramatically.The successful completion of this project will result in a new generation of imaging lenses for high resolution spectroscopy. Potential applications exist in plasma research, monochromators, astronomy, remote sensing, x-ray microscopy, and neutron imaging.fresnel zone apertures, FP spectroscopy, zone plates, imaging lensSTATUS: Phase I Only
