Photonics Dictionary: M

A diagram used to represent the trichromatic variables of the components in a three-color combination.

The smallest angle through which light is bent by an optical element or system. In a prism, the angle of deviation is a minimum if the incident and exiting rays form equal angles with the prism...

A type of high-speed photographic shutter that uses Faraday rotation to produce exposure times as fast as 1 microsecond. It consists of two polarizers, set with their planes of polarization at right...

A term used to describe a nondirectionally diffusing surface that, when illuminated, appears equally bright from all angles. An example of this kind of surface is the screen used for the forward...

One of two types of solar time - the other being apparent solar time - the mean solar time is the time measured by the average hour angle position of the sun in the sky compiled over a period of one...

A wedge in a rangefinder or heightfinder used to displace the image produced by one telescope so that it coincides with that produced by the other telescope, thus affording a measurement of the...

An optical experiment carried out conclusively in 1887 that demonstrated that the ether, a hypothetical medium postulated by physicists to explain how light could travel in a wave motion through...

Equivalent to 10-6 radian, where 1 radian equals 180/pi degrees. A rod 1 km in length will be moved by an angle of 1 µrad if the end of the rod is raised 1 mm.

Mie scattering, named after the German physicist Gustav Mie, refers to the scattering of electromagnetic radiation (such as light) by spherical particles. Unlike Rayleigh scattering, which is...

Minimum object distance, often abbreviated as MOD, refers to the closest distance at which a camera lens or optical system is capable of producing a sharp and focused image. In photography, this term...

The smallest object that may be seen, measured in terms of the angle subtended by the object measured at the eye. Also referred to as minimum perceptible color difference (MPCD) which is a unit of...

The least space between two parallel lines that can be discriminated as a gap to the human eye. It is measured in terms of the angle subtended by the gap measured at the eye.

The smallest area of uniform brightness that can be seen by the eye. It is measured in terms of the solid angle subtended by that area from the eye.

With respect to a crystal, a monoclinic crystal consists of three unequal axes, two of which intersect each other obliquely and yet still form right angles to the third.

1. Viewed with one eye. 2. Describing an image as viewed from a single angle.

In an optical waveguide,- typically a multimode fiber - the distortion resulting from differential mode delay, i.e. axial rays (modes), with the shortest path length, will have the shortest...