Improved Angle Interferometer Based on Total Internal Reflection

We describe an improved interferometer for angle measurement based on the internal re flection effect. The improvement is achieved by eliminating the influence of wave-plate rotation on the measurement. In the proposed angle interferometer the wave plate is fixed and placed between a rhomb assembly and a retroreflector. This scheme not only allows the angle interferometer to keep the optical configuration compact but also doubles the resolution and can measure the pitch and yaw of moving objects. Both a theoretical analysis and an experimental verification have been conducted on the interferometer. The results indicate that the performance of the modified angle interferometer is greatly improved, especially when the rotation angle is large. The nonlinearity error of the measurement equation is also addressed. (C) 1999 Optical Society of America. OCIS codes: 120.3180, 120.3930, 120.3940, 120.4640, 120.5050, 260.5430