Automated high precision variable aperture for spectrophotometer linearity testing

A new automated linearity tester with a single variable aperture has been designed and built. It uses piezoelectric motors to define precisely the apertures required for application of the double aperture method of light addition. This design avoids many of the inherent shortcomings of two fixed physically separated apertures, such as interference and coherence between two separated beams and the need for an averaging sphere to compensate for beam noncoincidence at the photoreceiver. It also permits the assessment of system nonlinearity for arbitrary flux levels over an approximately 70:1 dynamic range without the use of a supplementary means of optical attenuation. The tester was specifically designed for use with the National Research Council of Canada Reference spectrophotometer, but it can be adapted for use with any instrument with a large stable measurement beam. The paper discusses the correct placement and operation of this device. The performance, as evaluated by nonlinearity measurements of a known highly linear silicon photodiode, shows a reliability of <1-3 parts in 10(4) over a 3400:1 dynamic range at a 97% confidence level. Several applications of this linearity tester to both photomultipliers and photodiodes are described. Transmittance results for several reference materials using these linearity corrected photodetectors are compared and show a typical agreement of better than 0.025% of the value.