Shack-Hartmann Wavefront Sensor

The Shack-Hartmann sensor is a well-known detector that is used to gather information about the phase of impinging light. Due to phase information not being directly accessible (in an experimental context) an array of microlenses is used to generate a pattern of foci. By analyzing this pattern, e.g. measuring lateral shifts of the foci, details of the impinging wavefront at each position can be retrieved. With the fast physical optics modeling and design software VirtualLab Fusion not only is it possible to obtain the original phase information directly – one of the perks of simulation technology – but also to simulate the propagation of the light through the entire Shack-Hartmann optical device. Below you can see some examples of the physical-optics simulation of Shack-Hartmann-like systems.