Analysis of Fibonacci gratings and their diffraction patterns.

Abstract

Aperiodic and fractal optical elements are proving to be promising candidates in image-forming devices. In this paper, we analyze the diffraction patterns of Fibonacci gratings (FbGs), which are prototypical examples of aperiodicity. They exhibit novel characteristics such as redundancy and robustness that keep their imaging characteristics intact even when there is significant loss of information. FbGs also contain fractal signatures and are characterized by a fractal dimension. Our study suggests that aperiodic gratings may be better than their fractal counterparts in technologies based on such architectures. We also identify the demarcating features of aperiodic and fractal diffraction, which have been rather fuzzy in the literature so far.