Advances and limitations of phase dispersion measurement by spectrally and spatially resolved interferometry

Spectrally and spatially resolved interferometry has become a powerful tool for measurement of relative phase shift of broadband laser pulses propagating through any dispersive medium. Since under usual experimental conditions the relative phase shift is due to the medium only, the values of group delay, group delay dispersion and the third order dispersion provide the common ultrafast dispersion constants for the given material. In this paper a detailed description of the state of the art of spectrally and spatially resolved interferometry is given. With the consideration of the effects of wavelength calibration, bandwidth of the light source, electrical and optical noises, curved wavefronts, visibility of the fringes, and mechanical vibrations of the interferometer, we show that the accuracy for the determination of group delay dispersion and third order dispersion can be as high as 0.1 fs2 and 2 fs3, respectively.