COMPENSATOR SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR COMPENSATING ANGULAR DISPERSION

The invention relates to a compensator system adapted to compensate for the angular dispersion of electromagnetic beams deflected by at least one acousto-optic deflector of an optical system, wherein the angular dispersion of each deflected beam is dependent on the deflection angle obtained by the deflecting acoustic frequency of the acousto-optic deflector, characterized in that the compensator system comprises: -a first lens group for spatially separating the deflected beams of different deflection angle and angular dispersion by focusing the beams substantially into the focal plane, -a compensator element having a first surface and a second surface, and being arranged such that the first surface of the compensator element lies substantially in the focal plane of the first lens group, and the first and second surfaces of the compensator element have nominal radiuses R1 and R2 that together work as prisms with tilt angles β and prism opening angles αp that vary with the distance from the optical axis so as to compensate for the angular dispersion of the spatially separated deflected beams, -a second lens group arranged so as to substantially parallelize the different wavelength components of each deflected beam exiting the compensator element while maintaining the angular variation of the beams deflected at different acoustic frequencies. The invention further relates to method for compensating for the angular dispersion of electromagnetic beams deflected by at least one acousto-optic deflector of an optical system, wherein the angular dispersion of each deflected beam is dependent on the deflection angle obtained by the deflecting acoustic frequency, characterized by -spatially separating the deflected beams of different deflection angle and angular dispersion by focusing the beams via a first lens group substantially into the focal plane of the first lens group, -compensating for the angular dispersion of the spatially separated deflected beams in accordance with the angular dispersion of the given beam, -substantially parallelizing the spectral components of each deflected beam while maintaining the angular variation of the beams deflected at different acoustic frequencies.