All-optical athermalization of infrared imaging systems using thermally dependent binary phase masks

Lenses used in many infrared (IR) imaging systems are temperature sensitive. One of the most popular IR optical materials for lens fabrication is germanium; nevertheless, it exhibits a strong temperature dependent refractive index, causing significant thermal focal shift which in turn results in image blur. An all-optical solution for IR lens athermalization with no moving parts based on a thermally dependent binary phase mask is hereby proposed and analyzed. It allows high quality imaging to be obtained for a wide range of temperature variations, with minimal performance degradation at nominal temperature conditions.