Transparent zero-birefringence copolymer and its optical properties

Birefringence is caused by both orientation of polymer chains and photoelasticity. These birefringences were compensated by random copolymerization of negative birefringent methyl methacrylate and positive birefringent benzyl methacrylate, but orientational and photoelastic zero birefringences were achieved with quite different compositions of the copolymers. Note that the birefringence of the copolymer that occurred in the process of injection molding was almost completely eliminated with a composition for orientational zero birefringence. The orientational and photoelastic zero-birefringence copolymers possessed enough transparency as optical materials that the total scattering losses were 30.4 and 19.5 dB/km, respectively, competing with the transparency of homopolymers. (C) 1997 0ptical Society of America.