Open AccessAnalysis of assembly tolerance compensation in microscope objectives with a free-form element at the aperture stop
Author(s) -
Alex Dorn,
Hans Zappe,
Çağlar Ataman
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
optics express
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.394
H-Index - 271
ISSN - 1094-4087
DOI - 10.1364/oe.465764
Subject(s) - optics , aperture (computer memory) , compensation (psychology) , exit pupil , microscope , diffraction , phase (matter) , ptychography , computer science , materials science , pupil , physics , acoustics , psychology , quantum mechanics , psychoanalysis
We analyze the feasibility of using refractive free-form phase plates at the aperture stop of microscope objectives as an alternative to active alignment to compensate for assembly tolerances. The method involves the determination of misalignment-induced aberrations at the exit pupil, and transferring them to the aperture stop while taking pupil aberrations into consideration. We demonstrate that despite being able to correct only for field-independent aberrations, this method can restore near-diffraction-limited imaging performance of passively aligned systems with practical tolerances, given that the as-designed system is highly corrected. We confirm the results via numerical simulations for two different commercial objective designs.