Photonics Dictionary: F

A standard for fiber optic data transmission systems being developed by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and associated working groups that will make fiber optic components from...

A phenomenon in which high optical power, encountering an imperfection in an optical fiber, destroys the fiber's core and causes damage to back-propagate down the fiber. It is caused by classic...

Fiber joints, also known as fiber optic splices, refer to the connection points where two optical fibers are permanently joined together to form a continuous optical transmission path. These joints...

A fiber laser is a type of laser in which the active gain medium is an optical fiber doped with rare-earth ions such as erbium, ytterbium, or neodymium. Fiber lasers generate coherent light through...

A fiber optic cable assembly refers to a complete unit consisting of optical fibers, connectors, protective jackets, and other components that are assembled together to facilitate the transmission of...

A fiber optic gyroscope (FOG) is a type of gyroscope that uses the interference of light waves to detect changes in orientation or rotation. It operates based on the principle of the Sagnac effect,...

A fiber optic imaging bundle is a specialized optical device composed of multiple optical fibers bundled together. Each fiber optic strand within the bundle acts as a conduit for transmitting light....

A fiber optic preform is a cylindrical glass rod or tube used as the starting material for manufacturing optical fibers. It serves as the precursor from which optical fibers are drawn. The process of...

A coherent optical fiber bundle in which the configuration is flat rather than round, giving an output in a line.

A fiber optic sensor is a device that uses optical fibers to detect and measure physical, chemical, biological, or environmental parameters. Unlike traditional electrical sensors, fiber optic sensors...

A fiber optic spectrometer is a device used for measuring the spectral content of light. It utilizes optical fibers to transmit light from a source to a spectrometer unit, where the light is...

A fiber optic transceiver, often simply referred to as an "optical transceiver," is a device used in fiber optic communications to transmit and receive data over optical fibers. It integrates both a...

The use of thin flexible glass or plastic fibers as wave guides — or "light pipes" — to channel light from one location to another. Fiber optics is based off of the principle of total...

An optical recording technique that uses light source(s), a beamsplitting cube, light detector(s) and an optical fiber chronically implanted in animal brain to deliver excitation light to neurons...

The distance between the surface of a ferrule and the surface of a fiber end, provided that the ferrule extends above the fiber end. If the fiber end extends above the ferrule surface, the difference...

A microscope in which laser light is delivered through single-mode fibers that replace the pinhole usually used in confocal microscopy. When the Gaussian mode is imaged from the fiber output onto the...

A fiber-coupled LED (light-emitting diode) refers to an LED device that is optically coupled to an optical fiber for the purpose of efficient light transmission. In this configuration, the LED serves...

A fiber-coupled photoconductive antenna (FCPA) is a type of optoelectronic device that combines a photoconductive antenna with optical fibers for the purpose of generating or detecting terahertz...

A method of terminating optical fibers by forming a lens directly on the end of the fiber, eliminating the need for precise end-to-end placement or epoxy sealing in fiber connections.

A wide-field multiobject spectroscopy system used in astronomy, in which a bundle of low-loss optical fibers positioned on the target images is rearranged at its other end into a linear array along...

Relation between a material's transport rate and the material's concentration gradient and the diffusion coefficient.

1. In raster scan television, one of the two scans that are interlaced to make up a frame. 2. See field of view.

A photodetector employing photoregeneration of carriers in the channel region of an FET structure to provide photodetection with current gain.

An expression of the tolerance of decentration of a laser diode from the optical axis: the region around the axis in the focal plane of the collimator in which the facet can be located and still...

The field of view (FOV) refers to the extent of the observable world or the visible area that can be seen at any given moment through a device, such as an optical instrument, camera, or sensor. It is...

Intensity of emission as a function of direction in a given plane.

An aperture located at an image plane of an optical system that determines the size and shape of the image.

The site behind the lens system in a camera where photographic media are positioned for exposure.

A mechanism in a camera designed to position the film in the focal plane for exposure.

A device used to scan images or information on photographic film for the subsequent relay of information.

An instrument designed to place nongraphic information, usually generated by a computer, onto photographic film. The information is generally encoded as a series of opaque and translucent spots, or...

The process by which the light from the images of photographic film is encoded into electrical signals for video transmission.

An interferometer spectrometer designed to measure thicknesses of thin films or layers by recording the interferogram and by having a computer within the instrument to establish the distance between...

The butt (edge to edge) splice of two pieces of film produced by a heat splicer that melts the edges together; used in editing motion picture film.

Filoviruses are a family of viruses that are responsible for severe and often fatal hemorrhagic fevers in humans and non-human primates. The name "filovirus" is derived from their filamentous...

1. With respect to radiation, a device used to attenuate particular wavelengths or frequencies while passing others with relatively no change. 2. See digital filter.

The necessary increase of a photograph's exposure time as the result of the additional absorption of light by the filter being used.

A grating used as a reflectance filter, particularly in the far-infrared. Small plane gratings, blazed for the wavelength of the unwanted radiation, are produced for this purpose.

A function used in a convolution filtering operation. The image to be filtered is convolved with the filtering kernel to obtain the enhanced image.

For a Fabry-Perot interferometer or etalon, a value for the transmission bandwidth which can be calculated as the ratio of the free spectral range to the full width half maximum of the transmission...

A fixed-focus camera designed to record the ink impression of fingerprints that have been impressed on a card or form for record purposes.

A method used to produce precision spherical and aspheric molded glass lenses without grinding or polishing.

A finite version of Shannon's sampling theorem that states that a class of functions can be reconstructed exactly by a sufficient number of spectral samples; the reconstructed function is an explicit...

The spectral transmission window in silica-based fibers between 830 and 850 nm.

The separate spectral lines formed by a diffraction grating that are characterized by one wavelength difference in path length between adjacent slits.