Wavefront shaping assisted design of spectral splitters and solar concentrators: SpliCons

Abstract: Spectral splitters, as well as solar concentrators, are commonly designed and optimized using numerical methods. Here, we present an experimental method to spectrally split and concentrate broadband light (420 nm - 875 nm) via wavefront shaping. We manage to spatially control white light using a phase-only spatial light modulator. As a result, we are able to split and concentrate three frequency bands, namely red (560 nm - 875 nm), green (425 nm - 620 nm), and blue (420 nm - 535 nm), to two target spots with a total enhancement factor of 715 %. Despite the significant overlap between the color channels, we obtain spectral splitting ratios as 52 %, 57 %, and 66 % for red, green, and blue channels, respectively. We show that a higher number of adjustable superpixels ensures higher spectral splitting and concentration. We provide the methods to convert an optimized phase pattern into a diffractive optical element that can be fabricated at large scale and low cost. The experimental method that we introduce, for the first time, enables the optimization and design of SpliCons, which is $\sim$ 300 times faster compared to the computational methods.