An optical metrology system for the measurement of the refractive index of glass

The measurement of the refractive index of parallel plated, optically simple, glass samples is a common and fundamental activity in numerous fields of expertise. This work aimed to optimize a known technique to a simple, cost-effective and reliable system to be implemented in a lab environment, with an accuracy in the results better than 10-2 . A setup with a 632.8nm HeNe laser, automatic stage and CMOS camera was used and data was acquired with the help of LabVIEW controlling software. All system components were carefully controlled and optimized with the help of an uncertainty budget. Measurements had an associated uncertainty in the range from 10-3 to 10-4 .