Characterization of photoelastic materials by combined Mach-Zehnder and conoscopic interferometry: Application to tetragonal lithium tetraborate crystals

Abstract: Mach-Zehnder and conoscopic interferometry are used to explore photoelastic properties of anisotropic crystal materials. In a number of cases an application of both techniques significantly improves an accuracy of piezooptic and photoelastic measurements. The performance of such combined approach is demonstrated on tetragonal lithium tetraborate (LTB) single crystals, as an example. Special attention is paid to methodological and metrological aspects, such as measurement accuracy and the quantitative error analysis of the resulting measurements. Performing the interferometric measurements for different geometries of piezooptic coupling the full sets of piezooptic and photoelastic tensor constants of LTB crystals have been determined. The acoustooptic efficiency, on the other hand, has been evaluated using the magnitudes of photoelastic constants derived from the piezooptical measurements. For the geometries with strong photoelastic coupling LTB demonstrates quite large acoustooptic performance with figure of merit value , $M_2$ achieving 2.12 $\times$ 10$^{-15}$ s$^3$/kg. It is several times larger than that of strontium borate crystals, nowadays the best acoustooptic material in deep ultraviolet spectral region.