A Simple LabVIEW-MATLAB Implementation to Observe the Wavelength Tunability of a Laser Diode With a Diffraction Grating

摘要

It is well known that one of the features of a laser diode is its wavelength tunability, which can be modulated with a variable injection current and/or temperature of its active region. The wavelength of a laser source is commonly associated with its output color in the visible spectrum; however, if a wavelength change is not long enough to be observed as a color variation in the output beam, a wavelength meter or an interferometer setup should be needed for a quantitative or qualitative observation, respectively. In this manuscript, it is described a simple method to observe the wavelength tunability of a laser diode when a variable voltage is applied to its input by analyzing the diffraction orders displacements produced when the output beam passes through a transmissive diffraction grating. This demonstration is suitable to be implemented in undergraduate engineering laboratories for topics related to optics, helping students understand basic physics concepts such as diffraction and wavelength. (C) 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.