Photonics Handbook

Over 60 years have passed since the first demonstration of a laser in 1960. After the initial spark of interest, lasers were for a while categorized as “a solution waiting for a problem,”...

The first high-reflectance mirror coatings for the UV and vacuum UV (VUV) were of the Al + MgF2 type produced in the late 1950s. Coatings of this design are still used today for multigas cavity...

What are thin-film coatings? The purpose of any optical thin-film coating is to modify the transmittance and reflectance properties of the substrate material to which they are applied. Most coatings...

Hyperspectral imaging spectroscopy has developed dramatically from a large, complex, remote-sensing satellite- or aircraft-based system into a rugged, compact, economically priced imaging and...

Designing devices that incorporate ultrathin films is an important means of enhancing yields. However, characterizing ultrathin films provides a challenge for mainstream metrology tools such as...

The basic difference between the household mirror and the optical mirror is that one is coated on the back surface and the other is coated on the front. For optical applications, a front-surface...

Applications facilitated by tunable lasers fall into two categories: situations in which one or more discrete wavelengths are not available from any single- or multiline fixed-wavelength laser, or...

Reading and writing systems for polygonal scanners differ in the use of the scanner. However, many performance characteristics are similar for both. In writing applications, a light source, usually a...

Plate beamsplitters Plate beamsplitters consist of a thin plate of optical crown glass with a different type of coating deposited on each side. The first surface is coated with an all-dielectric...