Zhu Guangzhi, Zhu Xiao, Zhu Changhong
School of Optical and Electronic Information, and National Engineering Research Center for Laser Processing, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China.
Appl Opt. 2013 Aug 10;52(23):5619-30. doi: 10.1364/AO.52.005619.
An analytical method of researching the light distribution properties on the output end of a hollow n-sided polygonal light pipe and a light source with a Gaussian distribution is developed. The mirror transformation matrices and a special algorithm of removing void virtual images are created to acquire the location and direction vector of each effective virtual image on the entrance plane. The analytical method is demonstrated by Monte Carlo ray tracing. At the same time, four typical cases are discussed. The analytical results indicate that the uniformity of light distribution varies with the structural and optical parameters of the hollow n-sided polygonal light pipe and light source with a Gaussian distribution. The analytical approach will be useful to design and choose the hollow n-sided polygonal light pipe, especially for high-power laser beam homogenization techniques.
