Diffractive optic

A diffractive optic having a surface profile obtained by a process comprising:

• identifying an initial performance metric for the diffractive optic including a substrate;
• selecting a test cell from an array of cells on the substrate;
• changing a height of the test cell by a predetermined height unit;
• computing images using diffraction-based propagation through at least a portion of the array of cells;
• determining a wavelength metric for each of the images;
• consolidating the wavelength metrics for each of the images into a perturbed performance metric;
• comparing the perturbed performance metric to the initial performance metric;
• and
• identifying whether the perturbed performance metric is an improvement over the initial performance metric.

A diffractive optic, comprising:

• a substrate;
• an array of cells distributed on the substrate having a non-linear arrangement of cell heights extending from a surface of the substrate;
• and
• wherein the cell heights comprise preselected cell heights for a substantially optimized performance metric of the diffractive optic across a plurality of discrete wavelengths.

A system for designing a diffractive optic, comprising:

• a performance module for identifying an initial performance metric for the diffractive optic including a substrate;
• a cell selection module for selecting a test cell from an array of cells on the substrate;
• a height modification module for modifying a height of the test cell by a predetermined height;
• an image propagation module for computing diffraction-based propagation of an image through the array of cells at a plurality of discrete wavelengths;
• a measurement module for determining a wavelength metric for each of the images and consolidating the wavelength metrics for each of the images into a perturbed performance metric;
• and
• a comparison module for comparing the perturbed performance metric to the initial performance metric;
• wherein the performance module is further adapted to identify whether the perturbed performance metric is an improvement over the initial performance metric and assign the initial performance metric with a value of the perturbed performance metric when the perturbed performance metric is an improvement over the initial performance metric, and wherein operations performed each of the system modules collectively comprise cell processing.