Ultrafast pulsed mode effects on the performance of grating-assisted output couplers of finite extent

The performance of grating-assisted output couplers of finite extent excited by finite ultrafast pulsed modes is characterized numerically by the finite-difference time-domain method. The results for pulsed excitations with extremely long pulse envelopes are compared with those that contain only a few optical cycles for gratings that are both long and short compared with the equivalent pulse length. We demonstrate that the shortest length of either the grating or the pulse dictates the far-field performance of the grating-assisted output couplers.