Tom D. MILSTER^*

Optical Sciences Center, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona 85721, U.S.A.

(Received February 3, 2003; Accepted May 6, 2003)

Two advanced optical system applications are implemented in a Matlab^TM based simulation engine. The applications are aligning a micro-optic fiber coupler and scanning an optical disk with a readout system having an effective numerical aperture of 1.8. Many phenomena, like scalar diffraction, vector diffraction, addition of aberrations, thin-film interactions, and Babinet decomposition are described in the examples. A powerful graphical user interface (GUI) is also described that allows users to define optical elements, program operations and control program flow. Users can also easily interface custom field operations to the simulation engine.

Key words: optical simulation, physical optics, laser alignment, fiber coupling, solid immersion lens, optical data storage0

^*Email address: milster@arizona.edu