Signal distortion noise in volume phase holograms

Signal distortion noise in volume phase holograms is analysed for the case in which the object beam consists of two plane waves. It is shown that, for a given (on-Bragg) signal diffraction efficiency, the magnitude of the signal distortion noise is inversely proportional to the square of crystal thickness. Furthermore, as a function of the angular position of the reconstruction beam, the signal distortion noise has two peaks: one at the Bragg angle and the other at a deviation Δθ 0 from the Bragg angle, where Δθ 0 is a function of relative angles between the components of the object beam and the reference beam. The on-Bragg peak of the signal distortion noise is experimentally located for volume phase holograms recorded in Fe-doped LiNbO 3. The measured angular position is found to be in accord with the calculated value. © 1977 Chapman and Hall