IMPLEMENTATION OF AN ACOUSTO-OPTIC METHOD FOR DETERMINING PHOTOELASTIC TENSOR ELEMENTS IN GLASS

Abstract

Glass is an amorphous solid and in a stress-free environment exhibits isotropic optical properties. When such a material is placed under stress the optical properties become anisotropic. Glass can be characterized by its stress-optic response which describes how the optical properties will change when it is subject to stress. The mechanical properties were measured for three Ohara glass samples as well as for fused quartz which was used to test the accuracy of the Dixon-Cohen method used in this thesis for the measurement of the individual photoelastic tensor elements. The stress-optic response of all glass samples was investigated using the Sénarmont compensator method and the Dixon-Cohen method. The Dixon-Cohen method is shown to be an accurate method for the determination of the individual photoelastic tensor elements of glass samples.