Photonics Dictionary

A beamsplitter is an optical device for dividing a beam into two or more separate beams. A simple beamsplitter may be a very thin sheet of glass inserted in the beam at an angle to divert a portion...

A piece of glass polished flat on one side, with a pair of polished faces that form an angle close to 180° on the other side, the dividing edge running down the middle of the plate. It is used...

Computer vision enables computers to interpret and make decisions based on visual data, such as images and videos. It involves the development of algorithms, techniques, and systems that enable...

A prism formed by dividing a Nicol prism in a plane parallel to the path of vibration of the transmitted light and taking out the wedge-shaped piece. After the pieces are rejoined, the planes of...

Image enhancement operations that involve altering gray-scale values. For instance, brightness sliding involves adding or subtracting an identical brightness value to or from each pixel in an image;...

A photometric instrument having two prisms clamped in optical contact to produce a photometric field with an acute dividing line.

Optical switching refers to the process of controlling the routing or transmission of optical signals within a network using various techniques to selectively switch or redirect optical paths. This...

An imaginary plane dividing a body into two parts so that each part is the precise mirror image of the other in the plane of symmetry.

In optical character recognition, the method of dividing a string of characters into separate, distinct characters.

A characteristic of laser output, calculated by dividing the speed of light by the linewidth of the laser beam. The temporal coherence length of different lasers thus varies from a few centimeters to...

A method of graphical ray tracing through a boundary surface dividing two media of differing indices of refraction.