Development of advanced sequential ray tracing simulator for lens systems using multi-functional holographic optical elements

Area of Science:

• Optics and Photonics
• Computational Physics

Background:

• Holographic Optical Elements (HOEs) are crucial for advanced optical systems.
• Simulating complex HOE functionalities within sequential ray tracing software presents challenges.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and introduce an advanced sequential ray tracing simulation model for lens systems incorporating Holographic Optical Elements (HOEs).
• To enable integrated analysis of sequential ray tracing and diffraction efficiency for HOEs within a commercial software package.

Main Methods:

• Implementation of a novel User Defined Surface (UDS) in Ansys Zemax Opticstudio.
• Development of integrated functions for sequential ray tracing and diffraction efficiency calculation of HOEs.
• Modeling of advanced HOEs with complex wavefront reconstruction capabilities.

Main Results:

• The proposed UDS successfully integrates complex HOE functions, including color and angle multiplexing, arbitrary astigmatic beam generation, and holographic lens arrays.
• Demonstration of complex HOE functionalities within a sequential ray tracing simulator for the first time.
• Validation of the model's capability for integrated analysis of ray tracing and diffraction efficiency.

Conclusions:

• The developed simulation model offers a significant advancement for designing optical systems with HOEs.
• This tool is expected to reduce design optimization time and iterative trial-and-error processes.
• The model facilitates the implementation of HOEs in applications like head-up and head-mount displays.