Modelling and design of modified Wollaston prisms and the application in differential interference contrast microscopy

Wollaston prisms and the modified Wollaston prisms, which are interesting for various applications like optical metrology, topography of surfaces and biological imaging, has been theoretically studied and also been practically applied. The previous studies are mostly based on ray tracing analysis and, as a result, the information that can be obtained are somehow restricted. In this paper, we propose a geometric field tracing technique for the simulation of light propagation through Wollaston prisms. In geometric field tracing we seek for the solutions to Maxwell's equations under the geometrical optics approximation, so that all the properties of light as electromagnetic field are retained. Using the proposed simulation technique, we present the simulation of a differential interference contrast (DIC) microscopy, in which the modified Wollaston prism is used as the key component.