Magneto-optical effects of transparent magnetic diffraction gratings

Magneto-optical effects of transparent magnetic diffraction gratings composed of bismuth-substituted yttrium-iron-garnet (Bi₂YFe₅O₁₂) were investigated. The off-diagonal components of the dielectric tensor of the grating are imaginary and real numbers for the light with 450 nm and 532 nm wavelengths, respectively. From precise observation of the first-order transmitted diffraction beam from the grating, the intensity imbalance and relative phase shift caused by the off-diagonal components are clearly observed to be 0.021 and 0.012 rad, respectively. - Highlights: • Magnetic diffraction gratings show intensity imbalance and relative phase shift in the conjugated diffraction lights. • We have fabricated transparent diffraction grating composed of bismuth-substituted yttrium-iron-garnet (Bi:YIG). • We observed the intensity imbalance using 450-nm laser and the phase shift using 532-nm laser. • The imbalance of 0.021 and the phase shift of 0.012 rad are comparable to the theoretical estimations