Wire grid polarizer based in-line laser interferometer for macroscopic and microscopic phase estimation of transmissive and reflective phase samples

Abstract This work describes a full-field and near-common-path in-line laser interferometer and interferometric microscope utilizing a wire-grid polarizer (WGP) placed normally on the laser beam illuminating the sample. The WGP serves the dual purpose of a beam splitter and a polarization separator where the reference and sample beams reflected and transmitted from it respectively are orthogonally polarized so that, unlike other conventional interferometers, polarization phase shifting is inherent in its architecture. This arrangement presents experimental results showing quantitative phase analysis of transparent and reflecting phase samples.