'Astronomical Society of the Pacific Conference Series'
Abstract
In submillimetre-wave heterodyne imaging systems, optical coupling provides the most efficient way of combining local oscillator power with the array of signals from the telescope. For systems limited to one local oscillator source an ideal optical-coupling scheme would produce an array of appropriately scaled images of the local oscillator feed at the detectors without any loss in power. One candidate for a beam multiplexing system is the combination of an interferometric couple with a type of binary phase grating known as a Dammann grating. In this paper, we consider in some detail the feasibility of such a system