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arXiv · 2510.14196

Diffractive Retroreflector for Distributed Sensing

Anne R. Kroo·Olav Solgaard
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Abstract

We introduce a modified corner cube reflector that encodes information from passive optical sensors in its retroreflected diffraction pattern, enabling remote sensor-state measurement over a single-ended optical link. The design interferes a reference path and a sensor-modulated path within the retroreflected beam to produce an interferometric signal suitable for reading out phase and amplitude variations with a squarelaw camera. This enables sensor-state determination in arbitrarily oriented passive nodes, extending coherent interferometric read out of chemical, biological, and physical sensors to scalable, robust, and inert field deployments.

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Anne R. Kroo, Olav Solgaard. 2025-10-16. Diffractive Retroreflector for Distributed Sensing. https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.14196

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