Photonics Handbook

Radiometry involves several activities. The two most common are the description and measurement of optical radiation, and, starting with the knowledge of some aspects of optical radiation at one...

Diffraction gratings are optical components with a periodic structure that separate light into beams traveling in predictable directions based on their wavelength. The grating acts as the dispersive...

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...

Electrical engineers are very familiar with the effects of shot noise, thermal noise, flicker noise and crosstalk, and recognize how these effects can reduce the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) in their...

Superresolution optical microscopy, for which the Nobel Prize was awarded to Eric Betzig, Stefan Hell, and William Moerner in 2014, has been one of the most momentous developments in the life...

The benefits of aspheric lenses are numerous: They allow for a reduction in spherical aberrations and are ideal for focusing or collimating light, as they can achieve a low ƒ-number. Aspheres...

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...

The term fluorescence is often applied as a synonym for photoluminescence, although luminescence actually covers fluorescence and phosphorescence. Both of these terms describe the process of...

Many common spectroscopic measurements require the coordinated operation of a detection instrument and light source, as well as data acquisition and processing. Integration of individual components...

When evaluating the surface of a component, surface roughness can be assessed by eye or by rubbing it with a fingertip. Common expressions include “shiny,” “lusterless and...

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...

As recently as five years ago, shopping for a microscope light source was fairly straightforward. For routine applications, it was tungsten halogen, typically 100 W, while for fluorescence, it was an...

Profiling beams under 10 µm in size is one of the more challenging beam profiling applications. There are numerous reasons for this, including the very small size. Focal plane arrays commonly...

Given the pace at which technology advances, there always seems to be a learning curve. With the abundance of consumer electronics available, there typically is no right or wrong way to use these...

With the understanding of aspheric lens manufacturing provided in part one of this article, designers have the tools to optimize their aspheres; the next step is to understand how to specify and...

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...

Light is a versatile tool for investigating physical and chemical processes in nature. Any specific system being analyzed may, through the light it emits or reflects, communicate information about...

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...

When purchasing an industrial laser system, the astute buyer will look for a Class 1 laser product — a system where the laser beam hazard is completely enclosed and there is no potential laser...

Optical design software allows the user to develop a configuration of optical elements that manipulate the trajectory of light for the purposes of creating an image, illuminating a target, coupling...

As you operate your laser, only a portion of the electrical power sourced from your laser driver converts to light energy. The remainder turns to heat, and the buildup of that thermal energy presents...

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...

Laser development for the microscopy market continues to be driven by key trends in applications, which currently include superresolution techniques, multiphoton applications in optogenetics and...

Single-crystal sapphire has been the material of choice for defense and other applications that require extremely durable optics, but aluminum oxynitride (ALON) and magnesium aluminate (spinel) have...

The use of precision polymer optics is becoming an increasing necessity today as products demand sophisticated light handling components to achieve desired results. Polymer optics can be thought of...

For rotationally symmetric optical systems, either the lens or the detector moves along the optical axis to maintain optical performance. If the compensating axial motion is accomplished without the...

Any number of medical, industrial, and analytical applications requires the detection of light. Chemiluminescence, bioluminescence, fluorescence, and atomic absorption are just a few, and all require...

Double-sided processing is a batch-type process that uses planetary action — generally with loose, abrasive particles suspended in a liquid vehicle — to abrade material almost equally...

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’...

An integrating sphere’s function is to spatially integrate radiant flux (light). However, before one can optimize a sphere design for a particular application, it is important to understand how...

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...

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,”...

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...

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...

The wavelength range of commercially available LEDs with single-element output power of at least 5 mW is 275 to 950 nm. Each wavelength range is made from a specific semiconductor material family,...

That portion of the spectrum that the eye can see — and its rainbow of colors — is rather small, covering approximately 360 to 830 nm. What colors we perceive depends on wavelength, while...

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...

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...

An optical time-domain reflectometer sends short pulses of light into a fiber and measures its reflections as a function of time. The delay of these reflections to the detector as well as their...

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...

Photonics Rules of Thumb Scientists and engineers tend to want to answer simple relational questions with a blackboard covered with equations, even when questioners just want a rough estimate to...

With a specific gravity of 1.85 g/cm3, beryllium is the lightest metal that is workable. It is 45 percent lighter than aluminum and approximately five times as stiff. Its stiffness to weight ratio...

Abbe Error — Linear off-axis errors introduced by angular deviations coupled to a moment arm at the point of interest on stage mounted devices (θ in Figure 1). The effect of Abbe error...

Excimers are pulsed gas lasers that deliver high output power and pulse energies in the ultraviolet and deep-ultraviolet wavelengths. This enables them to power applications that cannot be supported...

Since their invention in the late 1960s, charge-coupled devices, also called CCDs, have found widespread use in imaging applications. Electronic cameras based on CCD technology are used in...

Image intensification, the basis of night vision, is a complex conversion of energy particles that occurs within a vacuum tube. An image-intensifier system works by collecting photons through an...