Photonics Dictionary

A device that responds to incident light but does not generate light.

A corner cube, also known as a corner reflector or retroreflector prism, is a type of optical device used to reflect light or electromagnetic waves back towards their source with minimal deviation in...

An optical circuit, either monolithic or hybrid, composed of active and passive components, used for coupling between optoelectronic devices and providing signal processing functions.

A passive optical network (PON) is a telecommunications network architecture that uses optical fibers and passive optical components to provide high-speed broadband services to end-users. In a PON...

A photonic integrated circuit (PIC) is a compact and integrated device that incorporates multiple photonic components and functions on a single chip, similar to the way electronic integrated circuits...

In passive optical components, loss that varies as the polarization state of the propagating wave changes. Expressed as the difference between the maximum and minimum loss in decibels.

A retroreflector is an optical device or structure that reflects incident light or electromagnetic waves back to their source, regardless of the direction from which the light approaches. Unlike...