Frequency scanning interferometry immune to length drift using a pair of vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser diodes

In laser frequency scanning interferometry for measurements of absolute lengths, a small drift in the measured length during the frequency scan yields an enlarged offset error in the measured result. Although such an error is unavoidable for an on-site interferometric system, methods for solving this problem have not been developed. We propose a frequency scanning interferometric system immune to the dynamic length change employing a pair of vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser diodes whose frequencies are equally scanned in opposite directions. The offset error is canceled by averaging the two phase shifts of the interferograms obtained from the light sources.