An optical tunable filter array based on LCOS phase grating

This paper reports an optical tunable filter array (TFA) based on a LCOS (liquid crystal on silicon) chip. The input broadband optical beam is first dispersed by a bulk grating and then incident on the LCOS chip. The LCOS chip is phase-only modulated and constructed as a dynamic reflective phase grating. The phase modulation is adjusted to meet the Littrow angle for a specified passband wavelength and thus the optical beam corresponding to this wavelength is steered to the output. The input/output optical beams are coupled to optical fibers with a dual-fiber collimator. Four dual-fiber collimators are vertically aligned as the inputs/outputs and the pixels of the LCOS chip are vertically allocated as four independent zones. Thus the device can act as a 4-channel TFA, which is assembled and functionally demonstrated.