Definitions

A method of measuring complex sequential photosynthetic reactions by varying the pulse time and wavelength of light generated by a combination of argon-ion and dye lasers.

A plasma accelerator is a type of particle accelerator that uses electric fields and magnetic fields to accelerate charged particles, typically electrons or ions, by exploiting the motion of charged...

For a pulsed laser, the product of the energy per pulse (joule) and the pulse frequency (hertz); expressed in watts.

Power modulation refers to the intentional variation of power levels in a signal, often in the context of electronic communication systems. This modulation technique is used to encode information...

Acronym for profile resolution obtained by excitation. In its simplest form, probe involves the overlap of two counter-propagating laser pulses of appropriate wavelength, such that one pulse...

A device used to rapidly change the Q of an optical resonator. It is used in the optical resonator of a laser to prevent lasing action until a high level of inversion (optical gain and energy...

Q-switched operation, or q-switching, is a technique used in lasers to produce short and intense pulses of light. The term "Q" in q-switching stands for "quality factor," which is a measure of the...

Q-switching, short for "quenching-switching," is a technique used in lasers to generate short, high-energy pulses of light. The term "Q" refers to the quality factor of the laser cavity, which...

A device with a limited number of possible output values (sometimes able to be selected) that can translate an incoming signal into these values or codes for outputting. See pulse code modulation. In...

A type of laser diode that operates at long pulsewidths.

A laser that generates a succession of pulses at a high enough repetition rate to appear continuous. The pump source is switched on for short intervals, nominally equal to the lifetime of the...

In the dye laser, the molecule that takes out energy from the triplet state during collisions between the dye and quencher to achieve long-pulse emission.

The inhibition or elimination of one process by another process. The stimulated emission of a laser oscillator can be quenched by a pulse of radiation of the same frequency traversing the oscillator...

The time interval of no activity occurring between each pulse during transmission.

A type of multiple-pass amplifier in which no optical leakage is allowed until a finite number of passes has occurred; at this time the entire cavity output is released as one pulse.

A saturable absorber is a type of optical device that exhibits variable absorption properties depending on the intensity of incident light. In essence, it becomes less absorbent as the light...

Oscilloscope electronic circuit that produces an output pulse whose pulse width is determined by the time that the output voltage exceeds a specified level.

A nonlinear label-free imaging technique commonly used during surgical procedures for the visualization of collagen fibers and muscle tissue (myosin) with submillimeter resolution. During the...

A self-interference effect that generates random patterns; secondary speckle pattern (SSP) typically occurs in diffuse reflections of a laser on paper, white paint or rough surfaces. By tracking both...

Self-phase modulation (SPM) is a nonlinear optical phenomenon that occurs when an intense laser beam passes through a medium, causing a change in the phase of the light due to its interaction with...

Also referred to as the width of the dark pulse. This is the time interval between the instant the particle approaches the beam and the instant the particle leaves the beam.

A single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) is a specialized type of photodetector designed to detect extremely weak optical signals, down to the level of single photons. SPADs are widely used in...

A technique for observing the decay of light emissions from sources following their pulsed excitations, based on recording the arrival time of the first photoelectron after excitation. After many...

Any isolated wave that propagates without dispersion of energy. Specifically to photonics, an ultrashort pulse of laser light that propagates through a waveguide without characteristic chromatic...

A color center laser whose output is coupled to an external control laser cavity and then fed back to the main laser cavity to provide enhanced pulse shaping, leading to ultrashort pulse generation.

A semiconductor laser that operates in the infrared and that is pumped with strong pulses of radiation from a second laser. Dependent on quantum-mechanical principles, it can be tuned over a large...

Potential alternative to the conventional pulse approximation method of digital image processing because of its highly desirable interpolating and approximating characteristics.

A memory system composed of a stack of holographic plates, a mode-locked laser and a rapid detector array. Ultrashort laser pulses are used to extract information from the stack. In this way, storage...

Light from a pulsed laser focused into nonsaturable absorbing fluid that generates a strongly backscattered light beam with a frequency higher than that of the incident light.

A streak camera is a specialized instrument used to capture and analyze ultrafast phenomena, such as extremely short pulses of light or rapidly changing events. Unlike traditional cameras that...

A pulsed interferometer that permits the continuous quantitative mapping of the surface deformation of an adaptive optical element (e.g., a deformable mirror) and provides the capability for...

Supercontinuum refers to a broad spectrum of light that spans a wide range of wavelengths, typically from the visible to the near-infrared or even mid-infrared regions of the electromagnetic...

Observed phenomenon in laser pulses in which a large number of excited electrons are created and in which multiphoton processes have produced seed electrons, and excited neutral atoms are...

Directional and coherent radiation pulses that result from an ensemble of coherently prepared states in an optical medium.

The technique of generating ultrashort -- down to subpicosecond -- pulses by pumping a dye laser with mode-locked laser pumps with cavity lengths the same as, or a submultiple of, that of the dye...

Imaging radar that increases the sweep of its along-track (or azimuth) capacity by measuring not only the time delay of the echoes returning from the microwave pulse transmitted by its antenna (or...

The process or device by which more than one signal can be sent over a single channel by using different time intervals for the different signals. This may be done by varying the pulse duration,...

The time domain is a concept used in signal processing and analysis to describe signals in terms of their behavior over time. In the time domain, signals are represented as functions of time, showing...

The elongation of a transmitted data pulse through a fiber optic due to the chromatic dispersion of the fiber material.

Time-correlated single photon counting (TCSPC) is a technique used in photon counting applications, particularly in the field of experimental physics, biophysics, and fluorescence lifetime imaging...

A Ti:sapphire laser is a type of solid-state laser that utilizes a titanium-doped sapphire crystal as the gain medium. The name Ti:sapphire comes from the combination of titanium (Ti) as the dopant...

Abbreviated TEA CO2 laser. A gas laser that provides shorter pulses and higher peak powers than conventional CO2 lasers. The electrical excitation pulse occurs transversely to the optical axis...

The formation and display of three-dimensional images by ultrasonic energy. In one technique, the energy pulses from an ultrasonic transducer scan the object through a liquid medium and, receiving...

A pulsed laser having molecular nitrogen as laser material and a wavelength output of 337 nm in the ultraviolet region. It is essentially a channel flashtube in which a pulse is applied to the...

With respect to a television system, a pulse transmitted at the end of each field to break off the cathode-ray beam as it begins the next field.