Earnshaw Medal
Earnshaw 2008 Nominees: Thomas Kelly
A simple non moving Fourier Transform Spectrometer: Hardware and Software Development
The concepts of Fourier theory and the frequency domain are ubiquitous in Physics. This report outlines three objectives that had Fourier theory at their heart. The first, and the one of most focus, reports on a design, construction and demonstration of a static non-moving Fourier Transform Spectrometer. A Wollaston Prism was used to split an incident beam and into two diverging components introduce a path difference between the two. This design has potential value proposition as an undergraduate laboratory experiment and this is also discussed. Also, a software package was written to calculate electron densities from plasma interferograms by analyzing their frequency domain components. Finally, a graphical interface was designed for a set of codes which implements deconvolution in both the spatial and frequency domains.
Supervisor: Prof. John Costello
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