Photonics Dictionary

An emulsion in which grains of the photosensitive material silver halide are deposited. Each grain, when exposed to light, either develops or fails to develop as a unit, leaving a dark or clear...

Spots in a polished glass surface that are opaque and have a silvery, metallic reflection.

An instrument that uses a blackened silver-disc reflector with a shutter to create temperature fluctuations that are proportional to the intensity of the solar radiation incident upon it. Using the...

Describing a surface that is coated with a film of metal of such thickness that it transmits about one-half of the incident light and reflects about one-half.

A hologram in which diffraction is produced by the silver image, resulting in a dimmer image than in a phase hologram, where diffraction takes place at the gelatin relief image left once the silver...

An astronomical mirror, also known as a telescope mirror or primary mirror, is a key component of a reflecting telescope. It serves as the primary optical element responsible for gathering and...

A chemical used in the developing of positive photographs that incites oxidation and thereby dissolves the negative silver to vary tone, color and intensity.

A compact, folded version of a Dove prism, made of high-index glass with a silvered base and used for image rotation.

A chemical solution that changes the silver salts (latent image) of exposed photographic film into black metallic silver (visual image).

In photography, the layer of light-sensitive material (usually a suspension of silver halide crystals) that coats the film or plate.

A highly reflective mirror that is usually flat on one surface and curved on the other, and that has silver, gold or aluminum deposited on glass, providing about 99 percent reflection.

A salt of formic acid that can be used to enhance the photosensitivity of silver halide crystals.

The Golgi staining technique (also called the black reaction) makes it possible to look at the nervous system by rendering neurons visible under light microscopy. After a long process involving...

Histochemical staining is a laboratory technique used in biology and medicine to visualize specific chemical components within biological tissues. This technique involves the application of various...

The range of materials that, unlike glass, may be used in the infrared. Water-soluble salts, such as cesium iodide, and other substances such as arsenic sulfide, selenium, thallium bromide-iodide and...

An optical component coated to reflect infrared radiation. Gold, silver and aluminum are typical coating materials.

An optical experiment carried out conclusively in 1887 that demonstrated that the ether, a hypothetical medium postulated by physicists to explain how light could travel in a wave motion through...

A smooth, highly polished surface, for reflecting light, that may be plane or curved if wanting to focus and or magnify the image formed by the mirror. The actual reflecting surface is usually a thin...

A mirror blank refers to the initial piece of material from which a mirror is made. It is typically a flat or slightly curved piece of glass or other substrate that serves as the starting point for...

Nanoparticle photonic resonator absorption microscopy is a microscopy technique that combines the principles of photonic resonators and nanoparticle imaging to visualize and study biological samples...

An instrument devised by Nichols and Hull for use in the measurement of radiation pressure. The device has two small silvered, glass mirrors that are suspended, in the way of a torsion balance, by a...

A photographic emulsion of the silver-halide type that is used to record the path of a charged traveling particle. The tracks recorded on these emulsions are typically observed under a microscope...

Optical materials refer to substances or compounds specifically chosen for their optical properties and used in the fabrication of optical components and systems. These materials are characterized by...

A hologram that is formed on a recording medium by changing the phase of the illuminating wave in correspondence with the recording exposure. It may be formed by contact printing onto a resist...

A material used as a protective layer on an aluminized or silvered mirror. It is evaporated on the mirror as a thin layer, and after exposure to the air the monoxide tends to become silicon dioxide...

Surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) is a powerful analytical technique that enhances the Raman scattering signal of molecules adsorbed on or near certain nanostructured surfaces. Raman...

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is an analytical technique that combines the principles of Raman spectroscopy with the enhancement provided by nanostructured metallic surfaces. Raman...

Tip-enhanced Raman scattering (TERS) is a powerful technique that combines Raman spectroscopy with the enhanced spatial resolution provided by a sharp metallic or dielectric tip. TERS allows...