Photonics Dictionary

In a general sense, any one of a class of instruments used to disperse radiation, visible or invisible, into its component wavelengths and for determining or measuring the resultant spectrum. In a...

A device used for the comparison of spectra used, in turn, for the comparison of elements, such as the absorption lines in the spectra of stars and the spectra of elements in the stars being observed.

A small handheld instrument consisting of a slit and collimator that feeds light into a small direct-vision dispersing prism. The eye is placed behind the prism to observe the spectrum of a colored...

A spectroscope having a diffraction grating for the resolution of light of various wavelengths.

An instrument that uses electromagnetic fields to sort out the relative masses of atoms and molecules.The same way an optical spectroscope uses a prism to separate light into its various wavelengths,...

A system composed of a prism spectroscope and compound microscope to provide the visual comparison of two spectra simultaneously -- that of the sample focused by the microscope and that of the...

A spectroscope having a divided circle and a means for the rapid reversal of prisms for the measurement of refractive index of the prism for a specific wavelength.

A microspectroscope equipped with a sensing and recording device, such as a camera, to measure the spectrum formed by microscopic samples.

The smallest angle through which light is bent by an optical element or system. In a prism, the angle of deviation is a minimum if the incident and exiting rays form equal angles with the prism...

The series of interference bands that appear in the spectrum when a specified glass plate is inserted into a spectroscope, from the side of the blue portion of the spectrum, so that the plate...