Achromatic correction for birefringent interferometers that improve Fourier transform spectrometers and hyperspectral imaging.

Spectroscopy and hyperspectral imaging are widely used tools for identifying compounds and materials. One optical design is a polarization interferometer that uses birefringent wedges, like a Babinet-Soleil compensator, to create the interferograms that are Fourier transformed to give the spectra. Such designs have lateral spatial offset between the no and ne optical beams, which reduces the interferogram intensity and creates a spatially dependent phase that is problematic for hyperspectral imaging. The lateral separation between the beams is wavelength dependent, created by the achromatic nature of Babinet-Soleil compensators. We introduce a birefringent wedge design for Fourier transform spectroscopy that creates collinear no and ne optical beams for optimal interference and no spatial dependent phase. Our 3-wedge design, which we call a Wisconsin interferometer, improves the signal strength of polarization spectrometers, and eliminates phase shifts in hyperspectral imaging. We anticipate that it will find use in analytical, remote sensing, and ultrafast spectroscopy applications.