Photonics Handbook

Photonics is the study of light and other types of radiant energy whose quantum unit is the photon. The impact of photonics on research, technology, navigation, culture, astronomy, forensics, and...

Early fiber lasers were inefficient and limited to low powers, until more effective methods emerged to deliver the pump light into the cladding. Valentin Gapontsev, founder and CEO of IPG Photonics,...

Developed in the early 1990s, the silicon photomultiplier (SiPM) is a solid-state photodetector whose sensitivity to light rivals that of a photomultiplier tube (PMT) in a regime where a few hundred...

Technological advances have resulted in new, higher-quality sensors that enable machine vision cameras to deliver greater features and functionality at a lower cost than ever before. These factors...

Materials processing with lasers is actually a broad term for a diverse range of applications. The major categories of these uses, and the lasers that service them, are summarized Table 1. At one...

Since its first successful operation in 1960 at Hughes Research Labs, the laser technology has been at the center of innovation and research. Semiconductor lasers first made their appearance in 1962...

By its original definition, a nanopositioning device is a mechanism capable of repeatedly delivering motion in increments as small as one nanometer. Lately demands from industry and research have...

Optical fibers are made from either glass or plastic. Most are roughly the diameter of a human hair, and they may be many miles long. Light is transmitted along the center of the fiber from one end...

Flat optics generally perform three main functions: They transmit light (windows), reflect light (mirrors), and fold light (prisms). While most optical manufacturers make spherical and flat optics, a...

Surface quality has become one of the most poorly understood specifications in the optics industry. A significant portion of the confusion stems from the two major competing (and largely...

An interferometer is an instrument that compares the position or surface structure of two objects. The basic two-beam division of amplitude interferometer components consists of a light source, a...

In general, there are three common approaches to reducing mechanical excitation of photonic systems. The first is identifying the sources of vibration and implementing ways to eliminate or reduce...

The optical materials selected for an optical system depend upon the application, the required system performance and the environment in which the system is to perform; thus the materials’...

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...

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,”...

Optical coatings are deposited as thin-film multilayers of a variety of materials using specific deposition techniques. Coatings are applied to optical components that are intended for use at...

The ubiquitous Nd:YAG laser has played many roles over the years. For the military, it has provided rangefinding and target designation capabilities. When used with nonlinear optics or as a pump...

Photonic components are key elements for the information technology (IT). Photonics technology covers the generation of information (cameras, sensors), its transportation (optical communication),...

Adhesives for fiber optic components that perform well on glass, metal, ceramic and most plastic substrates provide excellent chemical and solvent resistance. They also can act as an electrical...

While some design engineers know exactly what they need from their laser diode, others may choose a partner to navigate what can be a complex development process. Laser diode manufacturers know which...

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...

Just as an electronic connector provides a pluggable connection between electronic circuits, a fiber optic connector provides an optical one. The goal is joining a fiber to a transmitter, receiver or...

Controlling and minimizing heat output is desirable in most lighting applications. For example, conventional incandescent light sources are very inefficient with only a small portion of the...

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...

When physical structures get very small — on the order of molecular or atomic sizes with one or more dimensions on the nanoscale — their behavior and interactions with energy, including...

Lenses come in a variety of shapes, sizes and materials. They can be made of a single piece of glass or have multiple elements; their surfaces can be spherical, aspheric or cylindrical; they can be...

As bit rates increase to meet expanding demand, systems have become increasingly sensitive to polarization-related impairments. These include polarization mode dispersion (PMD) in optical fibers,...