title: Note: A portable rotating waveplate polarimeter.
abstract: We describe the construction and performance of a polarimeter based on a quarter-wave plate rotated by a model airplane motor. The motor rotates at a high angular frequency of ω∼2π×160 Hz, which enables the polarimeter to monitor the polarization state of an incident beam of light in real-time. We show that a simple analysis of the polarimeter signal using the fast Fourier transform on a standard digital oscilloscope provides an excellent measure of the polarization state for many laboratory applications. The polarimeter is straightforward to construct, portable, and features a high-dynamic range, facilitating a wide range of optics laboratory tasks that require free-space or fiber-based polarization analysis.
authors.affiliation: Institut for Fysik og Astronomi, Aarhus Universitet, Ny Munkegade 120, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark.
authors.forename: Søren
authors.identifier: 000000020009206X
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bobach
authors.affiliation: Institut for Fysik og Astronomi, Aarhus Universitet, Ny Munkegade 120, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark.
authors.forename: Adnan
authors.identifier: 0000000300977623
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Hidic
authors.affiliation: Institut for Fysik og Astronomi, Aarhus Universitet, Ny Munkegade 120, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark.
authors.forename: Jan J
authors.identifier: 0000000257823927
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Arlt
authors.affiliation: Institut for Fysik og Astronomi, Aarhus Universitet, Ny Munkegade 120, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark.
authors.forename: Andrew J
authors.identifier: 0000000245125355
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Hilliard