Beam splitters are classified by construction (plate, cube, pellicle, polka dot) and by function (standard, non-polarizing, polarizing, dichroic). Construction determines ghosting, damage threshold, and form factor. Function determines how polarization and wavelength are. A beam splitter or beamsplitter is an optical device that splits a beam of light into a transmitted and a reflected beam. It is a crucial part of many optical experimental and measurement systems, such as interferometers, also finding widespread application in fibre optic telecommunications. This division allows for the simultaneous analysis or utilization of the light's properties along two separate paths. Due to the quite large diffraction angle, the feature size of the element become similar to the wavelength of light. For a lossless beam splitter, R + T = 1.
[PDF Version]