Novel method to stabilize a laser wavelength unaffected by Fabry-Perot etalon angle drift

A laser with its wavelength stabilized to a Fabry-Perot etalon has many industrial applications. An ideal error signal for laser stabilization is the dispersion-like signal generated without wavelength modulation. We present a technique, by which the error signal is generated by the difference of two resonance peaks of a Fabry-Perot etalon. A laser beam is split into two beams, which pass through an etalon with a small optical path length difference to generate two partially overlapped resonance peaks. Subtracting one peak from the other yields a dispersion-like error signal. The zero crossing of the differential signal is insensitive to the angle drift of the etalon if the incident angles of the two laser beams are nearly equal but with opposite sign. (C) 2004 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers.