Origin of Bragg reflection peaks splitting in gratings fabricated using a multiple order phase mask

We have studied the effect of waveguide alignment on the reflection spectrum of Bragg gratings fabricated using a multiple order phase mask. We have demonstrated that splitting of certain Bragg peaks observed in earlier experiments reported in literature is caused by formation of the gratings with different periodicities in the waveguide tilted with respect to the phase mask plane due to the interference of non-symmetrical diffraction orders. Analytical expressions for spectral separation of the split peaks have been derived and verified against the experimental data recently presented in literature. The analytical predictions were also confirmed by numerical simulations of intensity distributions behind the multiple order diffraction grating and its projection on the tilted waveguide.