Abstract

A high-brightness pulsed THz beam system has been recently developed (1). This optoelectronic system is based on repetitive, fsec optical excitation of a Hertzian dipole antenna (1,2) embedded in a charged coplanar transmission line structure. The resulting synchronous bursts of radiation are collimated by a THz optical system into a diffraction-limited beam and focused onto a similar receiver. The THz system has exceptionally tight coupling between the transmitter and receiver, while the excellent focusing properties preserve the ultrafast time dependence of the source. Transmitted waveforms have been measured with subpsec resolution and with signal-to-noise ratios of more than 10,000:1.

© 1991 Optical Society of America