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161 terms

Photonics Dictionary

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transparent

Capable of transmitting light with little absorption and no appreciable scattering or diffusion.

transparent electrophotographic films

Imaging materials that generally consist of a polyester base, a transparent electrically conductive layer and an organic photoconductive top coating. When charged and exposed to light, an...

semitransparent and p-phase annular aperture

An aperture consisting of a semitransparent central region whose amplitude transmittance only is varied, and the relative phase difference between the central and annular region is fixed as p -...

semitransparent photocathode

A photocathode that receives radiation from one side and emits a photoelectric current from the opposite side.

absorbing wedge

A doped or absorbing transparent medium cut or molded into a wedge in order to measure the real and imaginary components of the refractive index. An internally reflected Gaussian beam is interfered...

adhesive

An intermolecular substance that serves to hold materials together. Two types are used in the optical industry: one, which must be transparent and colorless, to cement lenses together; and a...

aqueous humor

The transparent fluid that fills the portion of the eye between the cornea and the eye lens (the anterior chamber).

arsenic trisulfide

A dark red opaque material that is transparent to the infrared beyond 1 µm.

Becke line

A band of light that appears along the outer edge of a transparent material under microscopic investigation and that moves toward higher refractive indices as the microscope's focus is raised, and...

birefringent crystal -> doubly refracting crystal

A transparent crystalline substance that is anisotropic relative to the velocity of light.

blank

A piece of glass, quartz or other transparent material formed roughly by molding or cutting into the approximate shape and size of the finished part.

Bouguer's law -> Lambert's absorption law

Transmittance of a solution, or internal transmittance of a transparent solid, is an exponential function of the thickness of the layer.

brightfield

Brightfield refers to a type of microscopy and imaging technique in which the specimen is illuminated with a white light source, and the image is observed or captured against a bright background. In...

Christiansen-effect filter

A transparent powdered solid immersed in a liquid or plastic of similar refractive index but widely different dispersion; used to isolate narrow spectral regions.

color filter -> optical filter

An optical filter is a device that selectively transmits or blocks specific wavelengths, or colors, of light. Optical filters are used to control the spectral content of light in various...

coloring media

Transparent media which, when placed in front of a light source, change their color as a result of the selective absorption of some of the light.

combiner

A semitransparent mirror in an optical system that combines two or more output beams into a single coaxial beam.

copper oxide photocell

An early type of nonvacuum photocell consisting of a layer of copper oxide on a metallic substrate, with a thin transparent layer of a conductor over the oxide. When light falls on the cell, a small...

cornea

The transparent front layer of the eye. Light entering the eye is refracted (converged) by the outer surface of the cornea.

crystal laser -> solid-state laser

A solid-state laser is a type of laser that uses a solid gain medium (as opposed to a liquid or gas) to produce coherent light. The term "solid-state" refers to the fact that the active medium, where...

Debye-Sears ultrasonic cell

A device used in ultrasonic imaging to measure the velocity and attenuation of compressional waves in a transparent liquid by virtue of acoustic waves set up in the liquid. The wavefronts serve as a...

Descartes ray

The ray refracted by a sphere of transparent material that travels back as closely as possible to the original path formed by the incident ray.

diamondlike carbon film

A very hard, highly transparent coating based on forms of carbon, used to protect optical components from abrasion and chemical damage.

differential interference contrast microscopy

Differential interference contrast (DIC) microscopy, also known as Nomarski interference contrast microscopy, is an optical imaging technique used in microscopy to enhance the contrast of transparent...

diffraction grating

A diffraction grating is an optical component consisting of a surface with a periodic structure of equally spaced, parallel grooves or rulings. These rulings act as an array of closely spaced slits...

diffusion (light) -> light diffusion

Light diffusion refers to the process by which light is scattered or spread out in various directions as it interacts with a medium or material. Unlike direct transmission through a transparent...

diffusion disk

An embossed or marked disk, constructed out of a transparent material and used with a camera system to soften an image.

digital holographic microscopy

Digital holographic microscopy (DHM) is an advanced imaging technique that combines holography and digital image processing to capture and reconstruct three-dimensional images of objects. This method...

disc laser

A laser having a rod that is a stacked array of discs immersed in a transparent flowing coolant fluid. In this way, the cooling rate is increased, the temperature gradients are basically parallel to...

dome -> optical instrument dome

A dome-shaped structure used for some optical instruments in place of a flat window. The transparent material should be of good quality and the hemispherical surfaces should be concentric.

double-pass transmittance hologram

A hologram having an object wave that has been transmitted through the transparent object media to a mirror, reflected again and recorded on a medium.

doubly refracting crystal

A transparent crystalline substance that is anisotropic relative to the velocity of light.

electrophoretic display

An electrophoretic display, often referred to as an electronic paper display or e-paper display, is a type of electronic visual display technology used in electronic devices for the purpose of...

enclosed arc lamp

An arc lamp whose carbon electrodes are enclosed in a transparent chamber, resulting in an arc that is steadier, lasts longer and emits more ultraviolet radiation.

encoder -> optical encoder

A device designed to measure linear or rotary motion by detection of the movement of markings on a transparent medium past a fixed point of light. The encoder has a moving code plate, a glass disc...

enhanced Faraday effect

The occurrence of very large rotations in transparent materials at weak magnetic fields as predicted in the classical dispersion theory. This effect was discovered by Mavaluso and Corbino in 1898 in...

epidiascope

A device for projecting either opaque matter or transparent slides onto a screen.

episcope -> opaque projector

An opaque projector is a device used for enlarging and projecting images from opaque objects such as printed pages, photographs, or three-dimensional objects onto a screen or surface. Unlike a...

erbium-doped fiber amplifier

An optical fiber that can be used to amplify an optical input. Erbium rare earth ions are added to the fiber core material as a dopant in typical levels of a few hundred parts per million. The fiber...

etalon

An etalon is an optical device that consists of two parallel reflecting surfaces separated by a precise and known distance. It operates based on the principle of optical interference and is used to...

eyepiece micrometer -> measuring eyepiece

Also known as an eyepiece micrometer. A microscope eyepiece that has a finely divided scale ruled or photographed on a section of transparent glass, and located in the focal plane. The dimensions of...

fiber -> optical fiber

Optical fiber is a thin, flexible, transparent strand or filament made of glass or plastic used for transmitting light signals over long distances with minimal loss of signal quality. It serves as a...

fiber-coupled LED

A fiber-coupled LED (light-emitting diode) refers to an LED device that is optically coupled to an optical fiber for the purpose of efficient light transmission. In this configuration, the LED serves...

field emission display

An X-Y electrically addressable series of arrays with individual electron emitters bombarding a phosphor-coated transparent plate. The phosphor is induced into luminescence, similar to traditional...

flying spot microscope

A microscope that uses a flying spot scanner, directed through the eyepiece, as a light source to determine the features of a transparent specimen. The flying spot is modulated by the varying density...

Fresnel lens

A Fresnel lens is a type of optical lens that consists of a series of concentric grooves or steps carved into a flat, thin piece of transparent material, typically plastic or glass. This design...

Fresnel zone plate

A zone plate in which the zones are alternately transparent and opaque to specific radiation, and coarse enough so that no appreciable diffraction or focusing takes place. The Fresnel zone plate is...

FTIR spectrometer

FTIR (Fourier transform infrared) spectrometer is a powerful analytical instrument used to obtain an infrared spectrum of absorption or emission of a solid, liquid, or gas sample. It operates based...

germanium crystal

Germanium crystal refers to a crystalline form of the element germanium (Ge), which is a metalloid and semiconductor commonly used in various electronic and optical applications. Germanium crystals...

glass

A noncrystalline, inorganic mixture of various metallic oxides fused by heating with glassifiers such as silica, or boric or phosphoric oxides. Common window or bottle glass is a mixture of soda,...

Photonics Dictionary