  The Martin-Puplett interferometer (MPI) is a differential Fourier transform
spectrometer (FTS), measuring the difference between spectral brightness at two
input ports. This unique feature makes the MPI an optimal zero instrument, able
to detect small brightness gradients embeddend in a large common background. In
this paper we investigate experimentally the common-mode rejection achievable
in the MPI at mm wavelengths, and discuss the use of the instrument to measure
the spectrum of cosmic microwave background (CMB) anisotropy.
