Photonics Dictionary

An atomic absorption spectrometer (AAS) is an analytical instrument used to determine the concentration of specific chemical elements in a sample by measuring the absorption of light at...

The simplest method of transmission on a local area network. The entire bandwidth of the cable is used to transmit a single unmodulated digital signal. Baseband transmission is capable of...

A ground-based navigation beacon that emits pulsed signals which are picked up by aircraft making an instrument (blind) approach in landing. The signal is transmitted to the aircraft's L-scan...

A calcium indicator is a molecule that is sensitive to changes in calcium ion (Ca2+) concentrations in biological systems. These indicators are commonly used in various fields, including cell...

Camera Link HS (high speed) is a standard developed for high-speed digital data transmission in machine vision and industrial imaging applications. It is an evolution of the original Camera Link...

A television system that does not broadcast television signals but transmits them over a closed circuit.

CoaXPress (CoaXPress or CXP) is a standardized digital interface and communication protocol used primarily in machine vision and industrial imaging applications. It enables high-speed data...

A fiber optic communications system that works on the principles of homodyning or heterodyning. The transmitting laser produces an optical wave that is modulated in amplitude, phase or frequency by...

A coherent fiber bundle (CFB), also known as a coherent fiber optic bundle, is an assembly of multiple optical fibers arranged in a specific geometric pattern to maintain the spatial coherence of...

A diffraction grating is an optical component consisting of a surface with a periodic structure of equally spaced, parallel grooves or rulings. These rulings act as an array of closely spaced slits...

Digital signal processing (DSP) refers to the manipulation and analysis of signals, which are representations of physical quantities that vary over time or space. In the context of DSP, these signals...

A step-by-step method of reducing the amount of data in a digital video signal to transmit or store a high-quality image. The digitized picture is analyzed, and fine detail and redundant pixels,...

A signal traveling from transmitter to receiver that has an altered frequency due to the Doppler effect.

A spectrophotometer in which the beam emitted by the radiation source is split into beams that travel through the sample and a reference cell and are subsequently recombined to fall on the detector....

The method by which photographic film is scanned by an electron beam. One technique uses the uniform light of a television screen, focused by a lens onto the processed film, as a means of creating a...

The term "embedded laser" typically refers to a laser device that is integrated or embedded into a larger system or structure. In this context, "embedded" implies that the laser is an integral part...

A device used to transmit and receive images that have been converted to electrical signals over regular telephone lines; it includes a scanner, a transmitter, a receiver and a printer.

A waveguide or coaxial cable that transmits a signal from an antenna to a receiver or from a transmitter to an antenna.

A fiber Bragg grating (FBG) is a type of optical filter that is inscribed or "written" into the core of an optical fiber. It consists of a periodic modulation of the refractive index along the length...

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...

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...

Free-space optics (FSO), also known as optical wireless communication or optical wireless networking, refers to the transmission of data using modulated beams of light through free space (air or a...

Also known as amplification. 1. The increase in a signal that is transmitted from one point to another through an amplifier. A material that exhibits gain rather than absorption, at certain...

A camera tube widely used in television broadcasting. It consists of three sections within a single vacuum envelope. 1. A photosensitive film sometimes called the photocathode. The scene to be...

1. In relation to cathode-ray tube displays, errors in the signal's amplitude, phase or both that result in small, rapid aberrations in size or position of the image. 2. Errors of synchronization...

A cathode-ray tube that serves as a picture tube in a television receiver. The signal representing the picture intensity is transmitted to the electron gun grid so that the beam intensity varies with...

LiFi, short for light fidelity, is a wireless communication technology that utilizes visible light or infrared light to transmit data. Developed as an alternative or complementary technology to...

Technology that relies on a highly efficient photodetector that can detect incoming light signals at one frequency and transmit outgoing signals at another, thus permitting the sending and receiving...

A long-pass filter is an optical filter that allows longer wavelengths of light to pass through while blocking or attenuating shorter wavelengths. These filters are designed to transmit light with a...

Modulator/demodulator. An electronic device that modulates and demodulates signals transmitted over communications lines.

A modulator is a device or component that modifies a carrier signal in order to encode information for transmission over a communication channel. The process of modulating involves varying one or...

A character generation CRT that functions on the principle of secondary emission. The target holds a set of aluminum characters, select characters being scanned by the electron beam. The secondary...

An optical channel monitor (OCM) is a device used in optical communication systems to monitor and analyze the performance of individual channels within a wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM)...

Optical fiber is a thin, flexible, transparent strand or filament made of glass or plastic used for transmitting light signals over long distances with minimal loss of signal quality. It serves as a...

Optical noise refers to undesirable fluctuations or disturbances in an optical signal that can affect the quality or integrity of the transmitted information. This type of noise is particularly...

In an optical fiber or waveguide communications system, an optoelectronic device or module that receives an optical signal, converts this optical signal to an electrical signal which is then...

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...

Optoelectronics is a branch of electronics that focuses on the study and application of devices and systems that use light and its interactions with different materials. The term "optoelectronics" is...

Opsins are a group of light-sensitive proteins found primarily in the retinas of vertebrate and invertebrate eyes, as well as in other light-sensitive tissues. These proteins play a crucial role in...

Phase distortion refers to a change in the phase relationships between different frequency components of a signal. In the context of signal processing, it occurs when the phase response of a system...

A phase-modulated sensor is a type of sensor that uses modulation of the phase of a signal to measure changes in a physical quantity. In such sensors, variations in the phase of the signal are...

Photoconductive antenna (PCA) is a semiconductor element that generates or detects high-frequency electromagnetic signals. Compact PCAs based on gallium arsenide (GaAs) or indium gallium arsenide...