Photonics Dictionary: K

Lens which, by altering the phase, efficiently images through a holographic process.

A computer-generated kinoform used for data processing because of its use of incoherent light and its wide field of view, which facilitates parallel processing of two-dimensional data.

In an interlaced scanning electro-optical system such as television, the system resolution will be less than the number of active scan lines because of the random phase nature of the object being...

A simple form of astronomical telescope that uses a fixed objective and a focusable eyepiece. The objective forms an intermediate image in the instrument, resulting in an image that appears upside...

A cell filled with a transparent material that, when placed in a strong electrical field, exhibits double refraction. Since the two polarized elements of an incident light beam travel at different...

The Kerr effect, named after the physicist John Kerr who first observed it in 1875, is a nonlinear optical phenomenon where the refractive index of a material changes in response to an applied...

A Kerr soliton refers to a specific type of soliton, a self-reinforcing wave packet, that arises in nonlinear optical systems due to the Kerr effect. The Kerr effect is the phenomenon where the...

E.I. duPont's trade name for an aramid yarn used as a strength member in the jacket of fiber optic cable.

An array of spectral lines formed when a beam of electrons, striking a crystalline solid, is scattered. It is used in the analysis of the crystal structure.

A mount for an optic element or optics assembly, designed so that all six degrees of freedom are singly constrained. This assures that movement will be prevented, while stress will not be introduced...

An atmospheric nonlinear process unique to CO2 laser wavelengths, whereby CO2 absorbs 10.6-µm radiation and the CO2 molecules in the (100) vibrational state are excited to the (001) level, and...

For any point on a thermal radiator, at thermal equilibrium and for each wavelength, the emissivity in any direction is equal to the absorptance for radiation from the same direction.

A two-stage illuminating system for a microscope in which the source is imaged in the aperture of the substage condenser by an auxiliary condenser, and the substage condenser in turn forms an image...

Westinghouse trade name for an alloy of iron, nickel and cobalt, which has the same thermal expansion as glass and therefore is often used for glass-to-metal or ceramic-to-metal seals.

Astronomical detector consisting of a photocathode isolated from the target by a coin value from which electrons are focused on a nuclear emission, producing tracks on the emission. Track density can...

Pennwalt's trade name for polyvinylidene fluoride, a material used in the jacket of fiber optic cables where low smoke emission is deemed more important than flexibility.