Imaging laser diffractometer for traceable grating pitch calibration

A laser diffractometer for calibrating grating pitch is being developed at the National Research Council (NRC). Based on the METAS design, it features a precision rotary table, the sample grating mounted in Littrow configuration, a collimated spatially filtered laser source and the retroreflected diffraction order sent by a beamsplitter through a focusing lens to the null-position photodetector. The angle of various diffraction orders can be measured in sequence and used with knowledge of the laser wavelength to calculate the pitch of the grating. Instead of the usual quad-photodetector, the NRC system uses a charge-coupled device (CCD) video camera to capture an image of the diffraction pattern. Image processing accurately measures diffraction order centroid coordinates without a systematic error due to background noise or neighbouring pattern artefacts. The image coordinate system is also used to adjust the instrument and grating alignment and to investigate these sources of systematic error. Preliminary results with 1D sample gratings ranging in pitch from 700 nm to 10 µm are presented.