title: Differential-polarization dual-beam FT-IR spectrometer for surface analysis.
abstract: A new system for reflection-absorption Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy is described. It is based on an optical subtraction of the two output beams of a cube-corner interferometer, which are recombined, orthogonally polarized and passed onto a single detector, where only the difference signal of the two components is detected. The dynamic range of the signal is thereby reduced by at least an order of magnitude. Owing to the cube-corner reflectors the dual-beam optics are relatively simple and readily convertible for operation in the conventional single-beam mode. First results with an incompletely optimized system show high photometric accuracy and equal signal-to-noise ratio compared to the single-beam operation. Methods for further improving its performance are proposed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University of California, Riverside, Riverside, CA 92521, U.S.A.
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Hoffmann
authors.forename: N A
authors.initials: NA
authors.lastname: Wright
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Zaera
authors.forename: P R
authors.initials: PR
authors.lastname: Griffiths