Directionally sensitive photorefractive interferometric line receiver for ultrasound detection on rough surfaces

An adaptive heterodyne interferometer is configured as a line receiver using wave mixing in photorefractive bismuth silicate crystal. The line receiver is directionally most sensitive to ultrasound impinging normal to the line, and is significantly less sensitive to ultrasound impinging in other directions. Such a system is attractive in situations where the ultrasonic scatter from a specific direction is to be selectively pulled out in the presence of scatter from other "noise" sources. It is also demonstrated that the line probe system can be used to bridge the sensitivity gap that optical detection thus far has suffered vis-à-vis piezoelectric detection.