Design and experiment of a large aperture digital beam deflector based on electro-optic crystal switch array

A large aperture two-dimensional (2D) digital beam deflector based on electro-optic (EO) crystal switch array has been proposed and experimentally demonstrated. The deflector employs cascaded beams splitting units, which consist of LiNbO₃ EO switches and polarizing beam splitters, and a deflecting prism array to produce a 2D array of beam positions with a wide field of view. Design, construction, and performance of a 3×3 rectangle scanning array with a clear aperture of 6.5 mm are described in detail. Transmission efficiency, half-wave voltage, and scanning speed are measured to describe the performance of the EO switches. The effect of deviation of the input light from the optical axis is analyzed and a technique to diminish this effect is also proposed.