Achromatic wave plates for optical pickup units fabricated by use of imprint lithography

We report achromatic form-birefringence wave plates for optical pickup units. Material dispersion and structure dispersion are balanced in a rigorous multilayer design. A trilayer grating using SiN(x)/SiO(y)N(z)/SiO2 provides easily accessible process control points and relaxed fabrication tolerance. We demonstrate precise patterning by using nanoimprint lithography on UV-curable polymers, alleviating a major fabrication challenge. The achromatic wave plates exhibit 90+/-3 degrees retardance and >95% transmittance as measured by a Mueller matrix method at wavelengths of 640-800 nm.