A microlens array is a grid-like structure composed of numerous small lenses, typically arranged in a regular pattern. Each individual lens in the array is referred to as a microlens. These microlenses are typically miniature in size, often on the...

A defect on or in an optical element that does not appreciably impair the function of the surface.

That characteristic which makes a weapon system less visible to radar, optical, acousto-optic, infrared and other military...

In an interference pattern, that point where there is no difference between the optical paths of the interfacing wavefronts.

A lens or lens system used to transfer a real image from one point within an optical system to another, with or without...

1. In optics, the bending of light rays toward each other, as by a convex or positive lens. 2. Turning in the eyes to view a...

A combination of a polarizer and an analyzer that is used to detect birefringence or rotation of the plane of polarization...

A double-surfaced catadioptric spherical mirror whose spherical first surface consists of a negative meniscus (concave) lens...

Optical elements arranged with no spaces between, so that the light travels only through glass, not air.

The effect that the optical losses in a medium can grow when the medium is irradiated with light at certain wavelengths.

Abbreviated PAI. An imaging modality with a hybrid technique based on the acoustic detection of optical absorption from...

In the spectral sense, an optical source that emits one or more spectrally narrow lines as opposed to a continuous spectrum....

In a microscope, the optical assembly that focuses light on the specimen and into the objective.

Optical fiber optic switches are devices used in optical fiber communication systems to selectively route optical signals...

The coupling of laser or light beams via nonlinear optical techniques such as four-wave mixing to achieve spatial variation...

In coherent optical communications systems, a laser used at the receiving end to produce a steady wave that is combined with...

A type of laser used when a great amount of power is required. Avoiding the bulk of large numbers of optical lenses, this...

Multimode straight fiber capable of transporting linearly polarized light with any incident polarization angle, and in which...

The term half bandwidth (HBW) generally refers to the width of a spectral band or frequency range at half of its maximum...

A convex, concave or flat cast iron form that is used to shape a soft mold block of optical components.

An optical mounting device that permits adjustment around two perpendicular and intersecting axes of rotation.

The direct computation of the Fourier transform of the space variant system output of an optical processor with a single...

The distribution of energy about the image of a point source in the focal plane of an optical system.

In a symmetrical optical system this is a measure of the influence of the system upon the focus of a pencil of rays passing...

An ophthalmic instrument used to measure the magnitude and direction of the maximum and minimum powers of a spectacle lens,...

Q-switched operation, or q-switching, is a technique used in lasers to produce short and intense pulses of light. The term...

Specified curved optic intended for maximum collection of light, including off-axis rays, before leaving the exit aperture.

A process that employs heat to remove polyimide plastic coatings from silica optical fibers and capillary tubing.

The fiber optic connector developed and manufactured by Amphenol Fiber Optic Products.

Polarization refers to the orientation of oscillations in a transverse wave, such as light waves, radio waves, or other...

That layer in a semiconductor injection laser or light-emitting diode that provides optical gain.

The point spread function (PSF) is a fundamental concept in imaging that describes the response of an imaging system to a...

A vapor-phase oxidation process for fabricating graded-index optical fibers. It differs from outside vapor phase deposition...

An instrument that uses electromagnetic fields to sort out the relative masses of atoms and molecules.The same way an...

Photobleaching is a phenomenon in which the fluorescence of a fluorophore (a fluorescent molecule or dye) is permanently...

In optics, the process of combining two lenses having equal and opposite powers to produce a result having no power.

A compact optical projection system, mounted on or built into a helmet, and used to project data or a scene directly into...

The spectroscopic analysis of optical line shapes and frequency shifts, using the technique of light beating; i.e., the...

The physical length of the light path in a substance divided by the refractive index of that substance. See also equivalent...

A computer-generated hologram (CGH) is a holographic image produced using computational methods and algorithms, rather than...

An optical gate typically refers to a device or system that controls the transmission of light, allowing it to pass through...

Also referred to as physical optics - the area of optics in which the wave nature of light is essential when defining its...

Diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) is a nondestructive analytical technique used to investigate the optical properties...

A dispersion relation defined in order to value the reciprocal amount of dispersion. It is defined as the refractivity over...

In a fiber optic communications network, a circuit that connects two switching centers and does not branch off to terminal...

In optics, the geometrical form of an optical surface.

Process developed for the production of high-resolution patterns in electro- and magneto-optics. These high-generation...

The ability of an optical system to make an object appear larger. An optical element or optical system causing an object to...

One or more spots placed in the field of view of an optical system to provide a means of reference.

Optic surface cleaning liquid that may be applied to glass, crystal, dielectric and metal surfaces; however, may not be...

An optical switch that controls conduction paths into and out of a junction in fiber optic and integrated optical circuits.

A tool used to determine the curvature of a lens surface in terms of dioptric power. See lens watch; spherometer.

A center-opening shutter made up of several identical leaves that are mounted symmetrically around the optical axis of the...

Generic term for read-only optical data storage, source of the Philips-Sony term CD-ROM.

Optical components, usually reflectors, produced using proprietary techniques that transfer the precision of a master to a...

A method of manufacturing polycrystalline infrared-transmitting optical fiber by heating a single halide crystal billet and...

A type of sheathing for fiber optic cable that incorporates a coil of metal; often used in harsh environments.

The removal of a sharp edge on an optical element by grinding, to prevent accidental chipping of that edge during subsequent...

Angular deviation from the optimum alignment of source to optical waveguide, waveguide to waveguide, or waveguide to...

A transducer is a device or component that converts one form of energy into another. It is commonly used in various fields,...

A rear or front projection screen composed of minute optical surfaces that introduce a spread to the light beam that...

A method of fabricating a graded-index optical waveguide by means of an ion exchange process.

Supercontinuum refers to a broad spectrum of light that spans a wide range of wavelengths, typically from the visible to the...

Lens testing equipment refers to a range of specialized tools and instruments used to evaluate the optical performance,...

Metasurfaces are two-dimensional arrays of subwavelength-scale artificial structures, often referred to as meta-atoms or...

Distortion of an optical component as a result of heat, which can influence the divergence and the mode quality of a beam...

1. A lens formed to a desired curve and used to form a polisher. 2. A piece of glass included in a block to fill out the...

The fundamental tool of microdensitometry, the microdensitometer is an instrument used for the precise measurement of...

A computerized token-passing local area network (LAN) configuration adopted by General Motors for real time control over the...

The technology of manipulating light on a micro scale. In optical communications, this is usually accomplished using two or...

An aspheric mirror is an optical mirror surface that deviates from the shape of a perfect sphere, having a non-spherical...

Correction of an optical system at four separate wavelengths. This correction, longitudinal and lateral, is possible with...

A reflecting optic whose reflectivity is a function of the radial distance from the optic axis; can be used to convert a...

The instrument used to collect thermal radiation information on an object by scanning. It consists basically of a detector,...

Coating carried out in a sealed chamber evacuated by a mechanical pump in series with an oil diffusion pump to a pressure...

Optical tweezers refer to a scientific instrument that uses the pressure of laser light to trap and manipulate microscopic...

In fiber optic communications systems, generally one that operates between 1000 and 1700 nm.

The ratio of the diameter of the entrance pupil in an optical system to the equivalent focal length of that system. The...

Whispering gallery mode (WGM) refers to a phenomenon in wave physics, particularly in optics, where waves, such as light or...

Refers to a variety of methods and tools used to determine the surface contour and performance of optical components and...

A method of cleaning and drying coated optical components. The cooled parts are placed in a container above a boiling...

Optical design software refers to specialized computer programs used by optical engineers, physicists, and designers to...

The spot on the retina where the optic nerve is attached; it is incapable of sensing light because of the absence of light...

An optical system with different focal lengths or magnification levels in perpendicular planes to the optical axis.

When splitting the output of a single optical fiber into two or more fibers, the difference in the maximum loss between any...

A high-intensity source of incoherent white light in which a capacitor is discharged through a tube of xenon gas; often used...

In a laser, the optical resonator formed by two coaxial mirrors, one totally and one partially reflective, positioned so...

The transparent component of an optical reader that transmits the image rays of the characters to be read.

A thin-film device that integrates optics and electronics on a single chip to provide a passive-ring resonator gyroscope...

The determination of the temperature of a source by the detection of its incandescent brightness.

The scanning of photographs or transparencies of images, either by a vidicon camera or flying spot scanner, for the...

An optical component coated to reflect infrared radiation. Gold, silver and aluminum are typical coating materials.

The combination of two or more signals for transmission along a single wire, path or carrier. In most optical communication...

1. A group of optical fibers that are fused and then treated to produce a vacuum-tight optical fiber cone or plate. 2. An...

Technique using functional optical microscope with the addition of a coherent source collinear with the image path. The...

An instrument for determining the temperature of a hot object by examining the color spectrum of the visible light it gives...

A system that uses both reflection and refraction to achieve its focal power. While the relative powers of the lenses and...

A device using the Kerr effect to read back the signals from mechanically recorded tapes and discs. It consists of a light...

A method of applying antireflection coatings to optics that avoids the elevated temperatures normally used. A cold coating...

In photolithography, an opaque material used in masks that has a lower optical density and grainier composition than chrome.

A two-electrode, radiation-sensitive junction formed in a semiconductor material in which the reverse current varies with...

A technique based on the principles of laser trapping and used to manipulate the position of small particles by gradually...

CoaXPress (CoaXPress or CXP) is a standardized digital interface and communication protocol used primarily in machine vision...

In semiconductor physics and materials science, the term "III-V materials" refers to compounds composed of elements from...

An adhesive used to affix optical elements to an approximately shaped body -- usually of cast iron.

A visual system including a tiny television tube and imaging optics, all contained in a helmet to be worn by pilots in...

Fiber optic cable bearing many fibers independently sheathed and capable of carrying unrelated signals. They often surround...

Topological photonics is a branch of physics and optics that explores the application of topological concepts to the...

Second-harmonic generation (SHG) is a nonlinear optical process that occurs when two photons with the same frequency combine...

A Mach-Zehnder interferometer is an optical device used to measure the phase difference between two collimated beams of...

An infrared transmitting material used in the production of fluoride glasses for optical fibers.

The optical phenomenon that causes relative motion between two objects when the eyepoint is moved laterally. When parallax...

A rigid medium, generally a polycarbonate substrate coated with a reflective aluminum layer, that stores information (such...

A nonmagnetic instrument utilizing an electrofocus and deflection tube with a photocathode for imaging purposes. The optical...

Digital holographic microscopy (DHM) is an advanced imaging technique that combines holography and digital image processing...

A dome-shaped structure used for some optical instruments in place of a flat window. The transparent material should be of...

An optical scanning device designed to read information printed in the form of bars of different size by detection and...

A technique used in integrated optics where a groove is cut on a substrate surface and covered by a thin film to facilitate...

A group of lenses, or any combination of lenses, mirrors and prisms, so constructed as to refract or reflect light to...

Liquid crystal on silicon (LCoS) is a display technology that combines liquid crystal materials with silicon-based...

A phenomenon in which high optical power, encountering an imperfection in an optical fiber, destroys the fiber's core and...

Photometry is the branch of science that deals with the measurement of light, particularly in terms of its intensity and the...

The optical reconstruction of image information contained in a sound field. First the diffraction pattern, formed by an...

Near the boundary or edge of the field of an optical system; the outer fringe.

A device, also called a fluorescence lifetime instrument, that measures decay curves of fluorescing samples. It generally...

Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is a non-invasive imaging technique used in medical and scientific fields to capture...

A property of optical fiber that results from thermal stresses during manufacturing and is defined as the amount of...

A metal-semiconductor-metal (MSM) photodiode is a type of photodetector that consists of metal electrodes on a semiconductor...

The second adjustable iris diaphragm in an optical system. In the common microscope condenser system, it usually is located...

An optical fiber, usually a single-mode fiber, that has an outer cladding with nearly the same index of refraction as the...

An aerial photograph produced when the optical axis of the camera is perpendicular to the surface below.

A piece of glass, pyrex or quartz having one or both surfaces carefully ground and polished plano, generally flat to less...

A light absorbing material applied to ground optical surfaces during the process of making that surface non reflective. Such...

E.I. duPont's trade name for an aramid yarn used as a strength member in the jacket of fiber optic cable.

A thin film or coating that forms on various finished surfaces. On optical surfaces it usually denotes aging.

A crystalline ferroelectric material used primarily as a substrate and an active medium for thin-film optical modulators and...

Optical elements that use diffraction to control wavefronts. Diffractive optical elements include diffraction gratings,...

A photovoltaic cell, commonly known as a solar cell, is a semiconductor device that directly converts light energy into...

A camera designed with a telecentric optical system and a narrow field of view; the telecentric optical system (placement of...

A laser whose pulses are expanded, using gratings and optical fibers, before amplification and compressed to increase beam...

In fiber optics, the condition in which each fiber of a bundle carries a separate channel.

Adaptive optics (AO) is a technology used to improve the performance of optical systems by reducing the effects of...

The analysis of metal structure using an optical or electron microscope, generally with a camera, to record observations.

The layer of material in a laser diode from which the optical radiation is emitted; light producing region

The curved boundary between two optical media of different refractive indices, which causes convergence.

The figure of merit of a resonator, defined as (2p) x (average energy stored in the resonator)/(energy dissipated per...

The study of the optical properties of living tissue. Increased understanding of the behavior of light in this varied,...

A lens is a transparent optical device that focuses or diverges light, allowing it to pass through and form an image. Lenses...

An optical source that has a luminous distribution that is uniform for all directions.

Concave is an adjective used to describe a surface or shape that curves inward or has a hollow or recessed appearance. In...

One of a class of crystalline substances belonging to triclinic, monoclinic and orthorhombic systems that have two optic...

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is an analytical technique that combines the principles of Raman spectroscopy...

An optical system having two sets of components separated by an air space, while successive lenses in each set are cemented...

The angular change of an incident beam due to vibrational induced refractive index changes within a crystal.

A continuous-wave dye laser that uses a circulation pump and nozzle to provide an optically flat stream of dye across the...

Infrared optics refer to optical components and systems designed to manipulate and control infrared (IR) light, which lies...

A tool used to remove the outer cladding of an optical fiber without damaging the fiber core.

An aplanatic surface is an optical surface that is specifically designed or shaped to minimize spherical aberration and...

A type of thermoset rubber used to jacket fiber optic cables, including those used in outdoor military installations.

A type of glass optical fiber that provides low pulse dispersion over a broad portion of the light spectrum and as a result...

A controlled random search process, such as generalized simulated annealing, that has been incorporated into many optical...

The active control of various aspects (optical element position, airspace thickness, etc.) of an optical system that...

Also known as ocular. The lens system used between the final real image in a visual optical system and eye. It acts as an...

Reflectance confocal microscopy (RCM) is a non-invasive imaging technique that allows for high-resolution, in vivo imaging...

A device used to delay transmission of a signal for functions such as memory loops, sequential processing or built-in...

Photocells of various kinds used to measure photometric quantities; i.e., intensity, luminance and illuminance. Meter...

Functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) is a non-invasive neuroimaging technique that measures changes in hemoglobin...

In fiber optics, the annular region between two concentric circles; used to specify fiber cladding and core sizes.

Computer vision enables computers to interpret and make decisions based on visual data, such as images and videos. It...

A passive fiber optic coupler that divides light from a single fiber into two or more fiber channels.

A hyperspectral imaging camera is a sophisticated imaging device capable of capturing and processing data across a wide...

1. A mechanism that permits the focusing of an optical system.2. A means of obtaining the sharpest image from a cathode-ray...

Also called sine wave response and contrast transfer function. The modulation transfer function is the ratio of the...

A wedge-shaped piece of quartz typically found in a polarimeter to monitor and rotate the plane of polarization of plane...

A defect in the cleaved end face of an optical fiber in which the surface changes abruptly.

The smallest linear diameter to which a laser or other beam of radiant energy is capable of being focused, depending on the...

An approach to optical character recognition based on matching the input character against a set of stored prototypes.

A fiber optic gyroscope (FOG) is a type of gyroscope that uses the interference of light waves to detect changes in...

Aplanatic points refer to specific points in an optical system where certain aberrations, such as spherical aberration or...

A small low-power microscope or magnifier with a scale that is used to measure the exit pupil diameter and eye relief on...

In an optical fiber or waveguide communications system, an optoelectronic device or module that receives an optical signal,...

The rotation of an instrument (or the line of sight of an optical system) in a horizontal plane; transverse.

Micro-LED (micro-light-emitting diode) refers to a technology that involves the use of very small light-emitting diodes to...

A porous ceramic substance that is ground to a given optical form and on which a polished plate of glass is sagged by heat...

Phototherapy is a medical treatment that involves the use of light to treat various conditions, particularly those related...

An optical instrument consisting of a well- corrected objective lens or mirror with a light source and or object/image (i.e....

An optical system in which the only image-forming elements are curved-surface mirrors; e.g., a Cassegrain lens system.

The distance between the object and the cornea, or the first surface of the objective in an optical device.

A laser-pumped crystal with nonlinear optical properties inside of an optical resonator in which the output generates...

Structural color refers to coloration in materials that is not caused by pigments or dyes but is instead a result of the...

A threadlike inclusion within a blank of optical glass. Rarely found in quality optical materials.

Device in which the various circuit elements are fabricated in different substrate materials and then appropriately joined...

A device for the internal inspection of hard-to-get-at mechanical parts, such as rifle barrels, sewer pipes, oil wells, or...

A defect in the cleaved end face of an optical fiber in which a portion of the edge has broken away; the complement of lip.

An acousto-optic modulator (AOM) is a device that utilizes the interaction between sound waves and light waves to modulate...

In microscopy, the clear distance between the specimen being viewed and the first optical element of the objective lens.

Nanophotonics is a branch of science and technology that explores the behavior of light on the nanometer scale, typically at...

An instrument used to determine the absolute or relative scatter levels of optical surfaces.

A photodetector, also known as a photosensor or photodiode, is a device that detects and converts light into an electrical...

The device, usually made of glass or a similar material, that contains the resonant cavity and optics of a gas laser.

A two-sided mirror suspended by a pendulum mechanism. An autocollimator set normal to such a mirror surface will, by...

An optically bistable device used for photonic switching, constructed of a multiple quantum well biased by an external...

Reciprocal of the dispersive power of an optical material. See Abbe constant.

That property of certain optical devices, e.g., a penta prism, that maintains the angular relationship between the entering...

A transmission interference microscope that produces interference patterns of a sample by using birefringent plates that...

Nanoparticle photonic resonator absorption microscopy is a microscopy technique that combines the principles of photonic...

With respect to microscopy, also called dispersive staining, optical staining the projection of colors through areas of a...

1.) Generally, the electromagnetic spectrum within the wavelength region extending from the vacuum ultraviolet at 40 nm to...

Nonlinear optical materials are substances that exhibit optical properties that are not linearly proportional to the...

An optical material used in place of crown glass to produce lenses with extraordinary correction of chromatic aberrations....

The angle at which a given mode propagates down an optical fiber.

Extremely small organic and inorganic systems of molecules within a substance. In general, systems are colloidal size in...

The formation of a block by attaching optical elements to a plate with a ring of pitch or other thermoplastic material.

Plastic optical fiber (POF) is a type of optical fiber made from transparent plastic, typically polymethylmethacrylate...

In photonics, a lattice refers to a periodic arrangement of optical elements or structures, often on a microscopic or...

Computerized lens design algorithm that permits the lens MTF characteristic to be included and controlled during the...

A polygonal mirror, also known as a multifaceted mirror or facet mirror, is a type of optical component used in various...

The minimum amount of strength characteristic of an optical fiber, as determined by proof stressing; expressed in thousands...

Pixel binning, also known as pixel merging or pixel combining, is a technique used in digital imaging and camera technology....

A convention that defines specific dimensions of an optical system, such as the image distance or radius of curvature of a...

The amount by which an optical surface deviates from its ideal design value, expressed in wavelengths of light. Optical...

An infrared lens is an optical component specifically designed and optimized for transmitting, focusing, or manipulating...

A type of fiber optic sensor that detects changes in pressure, vibration, sound level or acceleration by monitoring the...

An optical system that uses refraction to form an image.

Diamond turning refers to a precision machining process used to produce complex optical components, particularly lenses and...

Mathematically defined as the product of etendue (or throughput) and the square of the refractive index, the optical extent...

A two-fiber optical cable containing two single-fiber cables that are connected by a strip of jacket and that can easily be...

In fiber optic cable, containment of the fiber or fibers within an outer protective tube in which they can move to some...

That point on the optical axis of a lens, to which an incident bundle of parallel light rays will converge.

In optical character recognition, a feature at the boundary of a character.

A laser that has a surface-emitting semiconductor gain element coupled to an external mirror designed to complete the laser...

A technique in photometry that uses an oxyhydrogen or oxyacetylene flame to optically excite a solution containing the...

A gelatinous fluid that can be used as a porous thin-film coating for optical components, including laser beam collimators,...

In optical communication systems, operations in which the amplitude of the pulses, as opposed to their width, determines the...

A Dammann grating is a type of diffractive optical element (DOE) used to create an array of equally spaced,...

A type of fiber optic sensor that responds to a change in the intensity of received light caused by the displacement or...

Diffuse stray light at the image plane of an optical system that results in reduced contrast and resolution.

Indication of emission brightness with degree of emission from an optical source.

In an optical waveguide, a mode whose field decays monotonically for a finite distance in the transverse direction but which...

A defect of a binocular instrument causing two images to be seen separately instead of being fused. It is caused when the...

A measure of the optical path length for light traveling from the sun or other celestial source through Earth's atmosphere...

A type of fatigue found in optical fibers, caused by water or another corroding agent.

1. In optics, the housing, usually cylindrical, that contains the lenses and iris diaphragm of a camera. 2. In fiber optics,...

A transistor designed to respond to either light or electrical signals.

Material used to integrate photoconductors into electro-optical systems. It should provide low resistance to the flow of...

The use of thin flexible glass or plastic fibers as wave guides — or "light pipes" — to channel light from one...

An optical filter is a device that selectively transmits or blocks specific wavelengths, or colors, of light. Optical...

Dispersion refers to the phenomenon where different wavelengths (colors) of light travel at different speeds when passing...

Typically used for the examination of manufactured or engineered parts, an optical gauging device, in which a backlight is...

Metamaterials are artificial materials engineered to have properties not found in naturally occurring substances. These...

A high-speed shutter, similar to a Kerr cell, that uses the birefringence produced in a liquid during the passage of an...

A closed-loop system that compensates for thermal blooming by optimizing only one parameter: the amplitude of the phase...

The rate of diminution of average optical power and the sum of the scattering and absorption coefficients.

A laser with output over a wide range of wavelengths spanning the far-infrared region of the spectrum (30 to 1000 µm);...

A measurement in optical thin-film coating processes whereby the gases remaining in the vacuum chamber after coating are...

A type of optical modulator with potential application in optical switching and displays, in which applied voltage causes a...

An optical part constructed of a single piece of optical material. It is usually a single lens, prism or mirror.

An optical testing instrument is a device or system used to evaluate and measure the performance, quality, and...

In optical character recognition, an intermediate step between character location and feature extraction.

A wide-field multiobject spectroscopy system used in astronomy, in which a bundle of low-loss optical fibers positioned on...

The natural log of the ratio of absorbed intensity over the total intensity which gives a constant value assuming a stable...

MWIR stands for mid-wave infrared, referring to a specific range of wavelengths within the infrared spectrum. Infrared...

A device that enlarges and strengthens a signal's output without significantly distorting its original waveshape. There are...

A device used to scan, with a small, intensely bright spot, portions of a picture surface and to transform the original...

In an optical system with a series of lenses, images formed prior to the final focal plane.

The altering of lightwaves by acoustic waves in a solid medium.

Plastic optics refers to optical components or systems that are made from transparent plastic materials, as opposed to...

Mie scattering, named after the German physicist Gustav Mie, refers to the scattering of electromagnetic radiation (such as...

An optical fiber with a hollow core filled with a liquid material that has a higher refractive index than the solid...

Fluorescent proteins are proteins that exhibit the property of fluorescence, which is the ability to absorb light at a...

For each mode in an optical waveguide, the term used to describe the process by which an electromagnetic signal is distorted...

An image that is formed when rays emerging from an optical system are diverging from the optical axis. The virtual image is...

The optical process, following grinding, that puts a highly finished, smooth and apparently amorphous surface on a lens or a...

The optical form of the crystal fluorspar, calcium fluoride, that is utilized for its low optical dispersion, its low...

The lowest frequency at which the magnitude of the fiber transfer function decreases to a specified fraction of the zero...

An aspheric lens is a type of lens whose surface profiles deviate from the traditional spherical shape. Unlike spherical...

Optical fiber is a thin, flexible, transparent strand or filament made of glass or plastic used for transmitting light...

The electrical distribution that serves to influence an electron beam in the same way that an optical lens affects a light...

A device that holds a number of filters and allows the filter with the desired characteristics to be rotated into an optical...

Instantaneous field of view (iFOV) is a term commonly used in the context of remote sensing, imaging systems, and optical...

Scientific complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (sCMOS) refers to a type of image sensor technology specifically designed...

A shift in the apparent position of an object when an optical element is added or removed.

A ruticon is an opto-electronic device in which light going through it can be modulated by an electric field. The...

Ray tracing is a rendering technique used in computer graphics to simulate the way light interacts with objects in a scene....

In fiber optics, the use of a detector to study the range of refractive indices achieved at various wavelengths. This...

A television camera tube in which a low-velocity electron beam scans a photoactive mosaic that has been created by an...

A scientific CMOS (complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor) camera is a type of digital camera specifically designed for...

A type of interferometer noted for producing narrow multiple-beam interference fringes. As a result, when compared with the...

An accurate metal prism or plane parallel plate that is cemented to an optical element and remains with it during a series...

A single number, defined by the computer program or the user that expresses the performance of an optical system. Also known...

A method of fabricating an optical waveguide by melting the core and clad glasses in two suitably joined concentric...

The physical limit of an optical fiber or cable to withstand an applied force or weight perpendicular to the axis of the...

A plane passing through a crystal that has the optic axis of the crystal and the light ray under consideration.

A thermoplastic or optically transmitting hard plastic produced by applying polymerization initiator and heat to a monomer.

Liquid crystals are a state of matter that exhibits properties intermediate between those of conventional liquids and solid...

An optogenetic technique that embeds genetically-engineered proteins to the heart to aid in terminating arrhythmias. After...

A type of optical fiber in which a silica core is surrounded by a hard polymer or similar material much stronger than the...

A holographic camera, also known as a holographic imaging system or holographic recorder, is a specialized device used to...

Not spherical; an optical element having one or more surfaces that are not spherical. The spherical surface of a lens may be...

A field of physics that deals with light as if it truly were composed of rays diverging in various directions from the...

An optical instrument that uses a yellow light of varying intensity with red and blue lights of fixed intensity to test for...

In a fiber optic cable, the longitudinal length required for the transmission media, wrapped around a central member, to...

An artificial star used to aid in adaptive optics imaging of the sky. The guide star is provided from a telescope system on...

A sapphire window refers to a transparent optical component made from sapphire crystal. Sapphire is a single-crystal form of...

The effect discovered by Faraday in 1845 whereby nonoptically active materials or substances become capable of rotating the...

A tough, durable, heat- and cold-resistant optical quality plastic used in injection-molded items such as streetlight...

Visible laser radiation, often optically expanded and collimated, used to induced temporary blindness from within a walking...

A technique developed by British Telecom in which the viscous drag of air is used to install optical fibers in narrow...

An optical system that superimposes a synthetic display providing navigational or weapon-aiming information on a pilot's or...

Also referred to as image visibility, the contrast of an image is the variation in the intensity of an image formed by an...

The arrangement of two Porro prisms so that the inverted image formed by certain types of optical instruments is the same as...

Optical glass that possesses a refractive index equal to or less than 1.5, and an Abbe number that ranges from 62 to about...

The figure seen through or imaged by an optical system. It may contain structures, natural or artificial, or it may be the...

Optical glasses containing the oxides of rare earths such as lanthanum to impart a very high refractive index combined with...

A prism or prism assembly that serves to displace the instrument's optical axis.

The area of optics that deals with the propagation of Gaussian laser beams in free space, or any general medium - i.e....

The branch of optics that deals with the study of the refraction of light, particularly by the transmitting medium of the...

A molded lens is an optical lens manufactured using a molding process, typically involving the shaping of a material, such...

A support for optical parts comprising a solid bed that permits precise longitudinal movement of one component relative to...

A radar system that uses electro-optic rather than microwave instrumentation and methods to perform its acquisition and...

Diffraction efficiency is a measure of how effectively a diffractive optical element (DOE) or diffraction grating directs...

A fiber optic transceiver, often simply referred to as an "optical transceiver," is a device used in fiber optic...

A thin-film device containing miniature optical components connected via optical waveguides on a transparent dielectric...

Wide-field fluorescence microscopy uses either naturally occurring structures or staining with fluorescent tags that are...

See atomic force microscope; magnetic force microscope; near-field scanning optical microscope; scanning tunneling...

In optics, the term denoting the lack of a fixed phase relationship between two waves. If two incoherent waves are...

A unit of frequency equivalent to 1012 cps. Named for Augustin Jean Fresnel, a French physicist known for his work in light...

An optical interference coating, vacuum-deposited on a circular substrate, whose transmission characteristics may be varied...

The study and photographing of microscope specimens in ultraviolet light; using an optical microscope containing fluorite...

A flexible single- or multifiber cable having a bundle of glass fibers arranged to transmit an image.

Design and engineering consulting services refer to professional services provided by specialized firms or individuals to...

An intermolecular substance that serves to hold materials together. Two types are used in the optical industry: one, which...

Quantum confinement refers to the phenomenon in quantum mechanics where the motion of charge carriers, such as electrons or...

A technique for creating optimal performance in a system by producing a specific beam irradiance distribution, usually...

Optical materials refer to substances or compounds specifically chosen for their optical properties and used in the...

The smallest angle through which light is bent by an optical element or system. In a prism, the angle of deviation is a...

The finishing of the edge of an optical element by grinding.

A Risley prism, also known as a Risley prism pair or Risley rotating prism, is an optical device used for controlling the...

A fiber Bragg grating (FBG) is a type of optical filter that is inscribed or "written" into the core of an optical fiber. It...

The maximum variation in thickness of a lens as measured around a diameter centered on the optical axis. The ETD divided by...

The process of forming a polisher by pressing it with an optical surface.

An automatic surface-generating process involving the removal of a material from a given surface. Optical milling typically...

A method of focusing an optical system by moving the front component (the lens closest to the subject) to change the...

A device used in measuring the attenuation of multimode optical fibers. A short reference length of fiber when combined with...

A means of testing optical fiber for macrobending losses by wrapping the fiber once at very low tension around a mandrel,...

A type of high-speed photographic shutter that uses Faraday rotation to produce exposure times as fast as 1 microsecond. It...

Blocking by means of a pitch ring, pitch button or a totally pitched block. Pitch, containing a soft filter, may be used...

The inherent laser amplitude noise relative to the average optical power produced by the laser; the RIN decreases rapidly as...

An APD detector, or avalanche photodiode detector, is a type of photodetector used to detect light or optical signals by...

A metalens, short for "metasurface lens," is a type of optical lens that uses nanostructured materials to manipulate light...

An optical instrument, generally a polarizing microscope, that is used to determine the interference figures and optical...

In fiber optics, the limitation on performance imposed by the amplitude of a received signal rather than distortion.

A laser device intended for crushing urinary tract stones so they can be flushed from the body. Light is introduced via...

A term describing an antireflection coating that may be applied to optics that cannot tolerate the high temperatures usually...

A device incorporating a spatial light modulator and a reference filter; used for matching an input optical waveform or...

Photoelastic equipment and supplies refer to instruments and materials used in photoelasticity, a technique used to analyze...

An adhesive used to hold optical elements to blocking tools. It is usually a thermoplastic substance such as resin, beeswax,...

A measure of the relative difference in refractive index between two optical materials. Most commonly used in fiber optics...

An optical device capable of transforming unpolarized or natural light into polarized light, usually by selective...

An optical coupling device that uses light to bridge the gap between incompatible wire communications systems. It contains...

An optical instrument consisting of an objective lens, a coherent (usually flexible) fiber bundle and an eyepiece to examine...

An optical fiber in which ions of a rare-earth element, such as neodymium, erbium or holmium, have been incorporated into...

Brillouin scattering is a phenomenon in physics where an incident electromagnetic wave (usually light) interacts with...

A microscope that allows examination of a small crystal and conveniently provides linearly polarized object and reference...

An instrument that employs the interference of lightwaves to measure the accuracy of optical surfaces; it can measure a...

A theoretical analysis of radiation loss from planar optical waveguides due to scattering by surface irregularities/surface...

In optics, a pattern, such as the Buchmann-Meyer pattern, that may be viewed when the record surface is illuminated by a...

The procedure by which the similarity of an optical signal or waveform to a reference-stored signal or waveform is...

In an optical waveguide, a ray that is completely confined to the core.

A diode laser is a type of laser that uses a semiconductor diode as the active medium to generate coherent light....

An alteration in magnification from the center of the field to any point in the field, measured in a radial direction from...

The numerical aperture of an optical system used to couple (launch) power into an optical waveguide.

A device that combines electronic and optical techniques to form a monitored infrared signal between 1 and 14 µm. It...

The low-refractive-index material that surrounds the core of an optical fiber to contain core light while protecting against...

The loss of optical power in an optical fiber because radiation escapes through its bends. The radiation loss caused by...

Also referred to as the V number in fiber optics; the normalized frequency is a dimensionless quantity, denoted by the...

A photon jet is a narrow, highly collimated beam of light that is formed when light interacts with small dielectric...

The central peak (including everything interior to the first zero or dark ring) of the focal diffraction pattern of a...

An optical instrument designed to permit the visual examination of the interior of the bronchi.

In the fabrication of an optical fiber, a layer that can be used to create a boundary against OH-ion diffusion into the core.

A device used to control or block a light beam by means of the Kerr electro-optical effect.

A scanning electron microscope (SEM) is a powerful imaging instrument used in scientific research, materials...

Spatial light interference microscopy (SLIM) is an optical microscopy technique that belongs to the category of quantitative...

A protective jacket added to an optical fiber to facilitate use in harsh environments. Armor usually consists of steel or...

A curve expressing an optical fiber's total transmitted power as a function of its launch angle at the input.

Abbreviated TEA CO2 laser. A gas laser that provides shorter pulses and higher peak powers than conventional CO2 lasers. The...

The science that deals with the measurement of optical absorbance (i.e. optical densities) over microscopic areas of a given...

Thermography is a technique that involves the use of an infrared imaging device, called a thermal camera or infrared camera,...

The process whereby sound waves are employed to form a three-dimensional image of an object. The process involves generally:...

The holographic recording of a microscopic specimen whereby magnification is achieved by alteration in a wavelength or...

The property of an optical system whereby only the effects of diffraction determine the quality of the image it produces.

A technology that uses electrically activated holograms stored within specially developed crystals to route information in...

The use of a reflective device, which can be fashioned from a variety of materials including gases, solids, dyes, aerosols,...

An erecting prism that inverts and reverses the image. It displaces the optical axis but does not deviate it.

In optics, a collapsible structure situated between the lens and film of a camera to allow variation of the distance between...

The use of computer analysis in the calculation of diffraction patterns for information on the design of optical systems. In...

In the field of optics and imaging, a mesoscope refers to an optical instrument that is designed to observe and capture...

Optical manufacturing tools and machinery encompass a wide range of equipment, instruments, and systems used in the...

A spheric lens, also known as a spherical lens, is a type of optical lens with at least one surface that is part of a...

The condition of the numerical aperture or beam diameter of the laser, LED, or other optical source being larger than the...

Epitaxial deposition is a process used in semiconductor manufacturing and materials science to grow a thin crystalline...

A cement used to reduce crosstalk in fiber optic bundles or plates.

In optics and photonics, "phase" refers to a property of electromagnetic waves, such as light, that describes the position...

An instrument designed to measure the refractive power and range of accommodation of the eye. See ophthalmic instruments.

The process in which the normal rate of fluorescent emission from a substance is enhanced by virtue of the optical gain of...

In atmospheric optics, the almost total blocking of light transmission in the atmosphere due to the scattering and...

A departure from ideal paraxial imaging behavior. The distortion of an optical field wavefront as it is propagated through...

A digital twin refers to a virtual representation or digital counterpart of a physical object, system, or process. This...

Freeform mirrors refer to reflective optical components that deviate from traditional symmetric or rotationally symmetric...

Lensless microscopy, also known as computational or holographic microscopy, is an imaging technique that captures and...

Handheld optical laser device containing a semiconductor or DPSS source. The output is corrected via internal collimating...

Injecting a gas (usually nitrogen) with a very low moisture content into the body of an optical instrument to create a...

Also known as a white-light interferometer. Measures surface texture and shape from nanometer-scale roughness to...

A laser, which stands for "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation," is a device that produces coherent and...

Diamond turning, also known as diamond machining or diamond cutting, is a precision machining process used to produce...

A bundle of rays that originates from an object point on the optical axis of a lens system.

A composite derived from aluminum alloy powder and silicon carbide, used as an optical substrate in air- and spacecraft...

The Lorentz oscillator model is a theoretical model used in physics to describe the response of a charged particle (such as...

A thermosetting material used in the jacket of fiber optic cables.

A technique for determining the nonlinear optical properties of a sample material by moving the sample through a focused...

The length of optical waveguide needed to attain equilibrium mode distribution for a specified excitation condition.

The use of chemicals or radiation to induce a desired change in a substance; e.g., some optical adhesives are set by...

An infrared source combined with reflecting projection optics to illuminate a target making it visible when observed through...

An atomic clock is a highly precise timekeeping device that uses the vibrations or oscillations of atoms as a reference for...

A microcomb, short for microresonator frequency comb, is a novel photonic device that generates a precise series of evenly...

An optical projection device designed to project positive color transparencies onto a screen for viewing.

Also known as TEA laser. A coherent optical source with a wide wavelength range in the infrared, visible and ultraviolet...

An instrument used for video or computer data storage in which a laser optical head is used to write digital information...

Seidel aberrations refer to a set of monochromatic aberrations in optical systems, named after the German mathematician and...

Anisotropy refers to the property of exhibiting different values or characteristics when measured in different directions....

The departure of an optical surface from its required tolerance or figure.

A silicon photodiode is a semiconductor device that converts light into an electrical current. It is a type of photodetector...

The difference in angular bearing of an object as seen by the two eyes, due to the separation of the visual optical axes.

A type of optical fiber loss resulting from the misalignment of fibers in a splice or connector.

A circular optical wedge (prism of small refracting angle) mounted to be rotated in the path of light rays to divert the...

This type of miniaturized system, referred to as CMOS qPCR, combines microfluidic technology with an ultralow-light CMOS...

The cutting of pitch tooling surfaces by an optical technician to permit polishing compounds to flow across the surface of...

An optical pyrometer that is equipped with a narrow bandpass filter to transmit a limited number of wavelengths to the...

A means of testing the strength of optical fibers to ensure reliability, by applying stress to the fiber so that any flaws...

Instruments used by ophthalmologists and optometrists to study the eye. There are, for instance, the ophthalmoscope to...

A diverging lens is a type of lens that causes parallel rays of light to spread out or diverge. It is thinner in the center...

A type of fiber optic sensor that detects alteration in position, distance, pressure, liquid level or temperature by...

The optical power loss caused by a space between axially aligned fibers.

A characteristic of optical fiber used to calculate the fiber's ability to maintain polarization. The beat length describes...

Characteristic of optical correlators in which invariance to more than one distortion parameter per axis of the processor is...

Means of correcting laser postweld shift. The correction procedure is applied to optoelectronic systems such as laser diode...

Refers to micron-size complex machines that have physical dimensions suitable for the fabrication of optical switches for...

Freeform optics refers to the design and fabrication of optical surfaces that do not follow traditional symmetric shapes,...

A material that can rotate the polarization of light that passes through it. An optically active material exhibits different...

The process in the manufacture of an optical system that gives it the required geometric shape.

A permanent, transparent, and highly transmissive adhesive capable of withstanding extreme temperatures that is applied to...

An assembly of optical fibers that will not transmit coherent images or information because the relationship of the fibers...

A memory system composed of a stack of holographic plates, a mode-locked laser and a rapid detector array. Ultrashort laser...

The power, expressed in prism diopters, that is the linear displacement, in centimeters, produced by the prism one meter...

Any structure having the ability to guide the flow of radiant energy along a path parallel to its axis and to contain the...

A photodiode having a conducting grid that covers the surface of the photodiode junction and intercepts and wastes some of...

A component used to modify light rays by diffraction; the HOE is produced by recording the interference pattern of two laser...

In astronomy, the method of deliberately viewing objects with peripheral vision to take advantage of the eye's greater...

Any testing method for materials and components that does not damage or destroy the test sample. Some of the methods used...

A fiber-coupled photoconductive antenna (FCPA) is a type of optoelectronic device that combines a photoconductive antenna...

A measure of the transmittance through an optical medium. Optical density equals the log to the base 10 of the reciprocal of...

A platform mount used to hold sensitive optical instruments immobile.

A lens having one or more toric surfaces. A toric surface is one having a maximum power in one meridian and a minimum power...

A system of mirrors that can be used to direct light from a single laser source into any one of a number of separate optical...

The degree to which a predetermined or previous setting of a positioning device can be duplicated by observance of the...

An optical system that records inhomogeneities within a medium by detecting the energy refracted by that portion of the...

A machine vision lens is a specialized optical lens designed for use in machine vision systems, which are used for automated...

A breakout cable, also known as a fan-out cable or breakout assembly, is a type of cable that combines multiple individual...

A term for thermoplastic optical materials; that is, those in which the polymer chains remain linear after heating and...

Optical glass refers to a type of glass specifically engineered and manufactured for use in optical components and systems,...

A mount for an optic element or optics assembly, designed so that all six degrees of freedom are singly constrained. This...

A robotic process commonly employed by automakers that enables high-speed and flexible production throughput by using...

An amorphous film in which cylindrical bubbles of reverse magnetization can be formed to follow circuit paths usually made...

A color center, in the context of materials science and condensed matter physics, refers to a specific type of...

A method for characterizing a fiber wherein an optical pulse is transmitted through the fiber, and the resulting light...

One or more optical elements – typically cemented together - in an optical system that are treated as a single group;...

Gallium nitride-based light-emitting diodes (GaN-based LEDs) are semiconductor devices that emit light when an electric...

In an optical waveguide,- typically a multimode fiber - the distortion resulting from differential mode delay, i.e. axial...

The process of aligning the crystallites in a piezoelectric material by placing a large DC field across the element at an...

A unique glass made up of nano-structured materials to create millimeter sized monolithic glass space-variant polarization...

Retroreflection is a phenomenon in optics where light is reflected back toward its source, typically in a direction nearly...

Quantum key distribution (QKD) is a method of secure communication that utilizes principles from quantum mechanics to...

A photomask, also known simply as a mask or reticle, is a key component in the photolithography process used in...

An optical time-domain reflectometer (OTDR) is a specialized instrument used in optical fiber communications to characterize...

A form of monochromator optical system consisting of two spherical concave mirrors used in conjunction with a movable...

The study of the transmission of radiant energy through crystals, especially anisotropic crystals, and their effects on...

Sputtering equipment is machinery used in the process of physical vapor deposition (PVD), specifically sputtering....

Ultrasound used in the cleaning of metal and optical parts by virtue of its vibration rates. Large acoustic forces break off...

A laser system consisting of a planar PN junction within a single crystal of gallium arsenide. The pair of parallel,...

A dichroic mirror, also known as a dichroic beamsplitter or interference filter beamsplitter, is an optical device that...

An erasable data recording and storage medium that uses a laser to heat the crystalline surface of the disc to a certain...

A well plate, also known as a microplate or microtiter plate, is a flat plate with multiple small wells or depressions...

Laser surgery refers to a medical procedure in which a laser, or focused beam of light, is used as a precision tool to cut,...

Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is an imaging technique used in medical diagnostics and biomedical research to obtain...

A fiber optic imaging bundle is a specialized optical device composed of multiple optical fibers bundled together. Each...

Integrated photonics is a field of study and technology that involves the integration of optical components, such as lasers,...

A special form of microscope that utilizes interference for observing and measuring the phase and optical thickness in...

A solid-state laser is a type of laser that uses a solid gain medium (as opposed to a liquid or gas) to produce coherent...

An edge-emitting light-emitting diode is a type of LED structure where light emission occurs primarily along the edge of the...

A reticle carrying patterns of various forms that can be rotated in an optical beam to cause variations in the intensity of...

Whole slide imaging (WSI), also known as virtual slide microscopy or digital pathology, is a technology that involves the...

A laser crystal, also known as an active medium or gain medium, is a solid-state material used in the construction of...

Optoacoustic, or photoacoustic, refers to a phenomenon and related techniques that involve the generation of acoustic waves...

Energy loss encountered at connectors in optical fiber transmission systems. The major contributors are mutual core...

Optical fiber with a large core, often a step-index fiber; "large'' is at times defined as greater than 85 µm.

An image that is formed when rays emerging from an optical system all converge to a point on the optical axis. A real image...

Optical elements that have been coated with one or more layers of dielectric, or metallic material. These coatings serve to...

Machine vision lighting refers to the use of specific lighting techniques and equipment in the field of machine vision,...

The intermolecular attraction between two surfaces, as between a substrate and a coating; it is an important factor in the...

A method of predicting the nonlinear optical effects exhibited by different molecules without synthesizing the molecules...

An optical channel monitor (OCM) is a device used in optical communication systems to monitor and analyze the performance of...

Azimuthal polarization refers to a specific polarization state of light where the electric field vector of the...

1. The process of aligning the optical axes of optical systems to the reference mechanical axes or surfaces of an...

A bomb guided to its target by some form of electro-optical system.

A tool made by imbedding small particles of diamond in the working edge. In the optical field, the most commonly used...

In a fiber optic transmission system, the conversion of received optical pulses directly to an electrical signal.

Laser drift typically refers to a phenomenon where the frequency or wavelength of a laser source gradually changes over...

Graphene is a two-dimensional allotrope of carbon consisting of a single layer of carbon atoms arranged in a hexagonal...

A material often used in the construction of optical instruments because of its low coefficient of thermal expansion (0.9 x...

In optical fiber, sharp but microscopic curvatures that create local axial displacements of a few microns and spatial...

An endoscope is a medical device used for visualizing and examining the interior of hollow organs, body cavities, or...

Etaloning is an optical phenomenon that occurs in imaging systems, particularly in devices such as spectrometers,...

Optical fiber channel characterization scheme based on three assumptions; the discrete mode spectrum can be replaced by a...

A device used to compare the luminous intensities of two sources by locating a point between the two light sources where the...

Differential interference contrast (DIC) microscopy, also known as Nomarski interference contrast microscopy, is an optical...

A function that quantifies the performance degradation of coherent communications systems, imaging systems and all systems...

A measurement of the spatial resolution of a line or area array in an optical character recognition scanning device.

In rangefinders and height finders, a rotatable or sliding wedge-shaped element used to divert the line of sight precisely...

A blank area (caused by insufficient inking of the paper) that falls within the range of an intended character stroke in an...

An optically pumped solid-state laser in which the active medium is a neodymium ion in a glass rod host. Abbreviated...

A helium-neon (HeNe) laser is a type of gas laser that emits visible red light at a wavelength of 632.8 nm. It operates...

Method of disk rotation used for optical disk drives, in which the spindle motor decreases the speed of the disk's rotation...

Fresnel reflection refers to the reflection of light at the interface between two different media with different refractive...

In a perfectly centered lens, the mechanical axis (defined by the ground outside the diameter of the lens) is made to be...

A fiber optic cable assembly refers to a complete unit consisting of optical fibers, connectors, protective jackets, and...

1. A localized fracture at the end of a cleaved optical fiber or on a glass surface. 2. An integrated circuit.

An optical data storage device that permits the user to store data (write) and play it back (read), but not to erase or...

1. A term used to describe the clouded appearance of an incompletely polished surface that scatters light. 2. The...

An optical table, also known as an optical bench or an optical breadboard, is a specialized platform used in optics...

A form of an element that cannot demonstrate optical activity as a result of dextrogyrate and levogyrate effects that are...

That part of a magnetic or optical tape or disc drive that retrieves data from or records data on the recording media.

A device used to evaluate the quality of fiber optic splices made in the field by injecting light into the cladding of the...

The locus of the points in the field of binocular vision that are observed singly. The images of these points correspond to...

A cosmetic defect on the surface of an optical element. A dig is nearly equal in terms of its length and width. The size is...

An electron-beam lithography (EBL) system is a sophisticated nanofabrication tool used in the semiconductor industry and...

In optics, the mechanical tension, compression or shear in optical glass due to internal stress caused by improper cooling...

A device to modulate spatially a collimated coherent beam of light with input data in optical data processing. It uses a...

A nitrogen vacancy (NV) refers to a specific type of defect or impurity in a crystal lattice where a nitrogen atom replaces...

The removal of optical elements from a block.

A surveying device used to measure vertical displacement of target centers of scale lines from a horizontal plane generated...

Interferometric modulator display (IMOD) is a type of display technology used in electronic devices, known for its energy...

A variation in propagation delay caused by differences in group velocity among modes of an optical fiber. Also called...

Ellipsometry is an optical technique used to characterize the properties of thin films and surfaces. It is based on the...

Fiber optic cable in which the arrangement of fibers within the bundle has been made random so that output light will be...

The ratio of emitted optical power of a source to the input electrical power.

Device consisting of a laser diode, beam-correcting optics and collimating optics in a single housing. Also called a...

A scale located on the eyepiece focusing screw and used to measure the amount of defocusing of the eyepiece in diopters. The...

Linear receive optics typically refers to the optical components and systems used in the reception (detection) of linearly...

An angle formed by the lines of sight of both eyes when focusing on an object. Also, the rate at which a ray approaches the...

The term delta error (delta-E) generally refers to the difference or change in error between two values or states. The word...

The adhesion of two sufficiently clean and close-fitting surfaces without the use of cement or glue. The optically contacted...

In the context of optical materials, the term "impurity level" refers to the presence of foreign atoms or molecules within...

An array or mosaic of optical surfaces. May be a number of lenses closely packed to form multiple images or many parallel...

A defect in the cleaved end face of an optical fiber, defined as multiple surface irregularities across the fiber surface. A...

The area of optics in which quantum theory is used to describe light in discrete units or "quanta" of energy known as...

An electro-optic modulator (EOM) is a device used to modulate the amplitude, phase, or polarization of light waves using an...

An optical system that rapidly alternates two similar pictures or scenes to permit the detection of small dissimilarities...

Time-lapse optical coherence tomography (OCT) refers to a medical imaging technique that captures a series of sequential OCT...

Laser optics refers to a broad category of optical components and systems designed for manipulating and controlling laser...

An accurately produced hole of any size and shape that is used as a masking device in an optical system. Pinhole apertures...

An optical fiber's absorption of electromagnetic waves due to hydroxyl ions remaining after contact with water.

A graphic reproduction of an object formed by a microscope or another optical system. Also an instrument used to make tiny...

A semitransparent mirror in an optical system that combines two or more output beams into a single coaxial beam.

A saturated compound of carbon and hydrogen used as a liquid coating material for optical components in high-power laser...

Fine lines, wires or threads used in the focal plane of many optical instruments to point out and locate particular objects...

Sapphire refers to a crystalline form of aluminum oxide (Al2O3) that is used in various optical and photonic applications...

A GaAlAs laser is a type of semiconductor laser diode that emits light in the near-infrared region of the electromagnetic...

Fluorescence microscopy is a specialized optical imaging technique used in biology, chemistry, and materials science to...

A laser fitted with up to eight optical fibers that transmit the energy to different workstations in turn.

In an optical system, the space between the object being viewed and the system entrance pupil.

Optimization method used in optical design computer programs that employs a variable-by-variable approach to construct new...

An optical waveguide in which only the lowest order bound mode, which may consist of a pair of orthogonally polarized...

The observation and measurement of the flatness of a mirror surface by contacting an optical flat with the mirror. The...

An optical device, such as a Nicol prism, capable of producing plane-polarized light, and used for detecting the effect of...

A fiber-coupled LED (light-emitting diode) refers to an LED device that is optically coupled to an optical fiber for the...

A fiber optic preform is a cylindrical glass rod or tube used as the starting material for manufacturing optical fibers. It...

A laser device used to establish a location or target usually for detection by an impact source e.g. missiles and guided...

A type of spectroscopy used extensively in the analysis of biological samples. Because most biologically synthesized...

Pertaining to optics and the phenomena of light.

A dichroic coating, also known as a dichroic filter or dichroic mirror, is an optical coating designed to selectively...

A laser diode module is a compact device that incorporates a laser diode, optics, and often other components into a single...

The element that resembles a lightweight metal, but when very pure, has a very high electrical resistance and is transparent...

1. A thin parallel plate of material that transmits in the infrared region. See infrared optical material. 2. A spectral...

With respect to color photography, the measurement of the way the color film modulates the radiant flux in the optical...

Specially designed optics for the observation and photographing of hydrogen in a bubble chamber.

A furnace used to heat glass materials. It may be a small laboratory-type furnace for small-scale experiments or large...

Flow cytometry is a powerful technique used in biology and medicine for the quantitative analysis of the physical and...

An optical system that is corrected for distortion and spherical aberration and therefore forms the image of a straight line...

A device used to rapidly change the Q of an optical resonator. It is used in the optical resonator of a laser to prevent...

A substance that transmits the infrared, but which is too delicate or fragile to be used in the form of a single crystal....

A distributed feedback laser (DFB laser) is a type of semiconductor laser diode designed to emit coherent, narrow-bandwidth...

An optical interference technique widely utilized as a method of nondestructive testing when determining the ray deflection...

Optical components exceeding 24 in. in diameter. The components are usually glass, acrylic or polystyrene and are used for...

A spectroscopic technique used to display the intensity of an optical pulse as functions of time and frequency...

An electrical or optical device used to convert color coordinates.

An optical element designed to correct each zone of a reflector or refractor for spherical aberration.

In the context of optics and lasers, a transverse mode refers to a specific spatial pattern of the electric field within the...

A change in the refractive index of an optical fiber caused by variation in the length of the fiber core in response to...

The clarity of an optically reproduced image. Definition is produced by the combination of resolution and acutance.

A paraxial light ray that extends from an object point on the optical axis.

A technique of optical storage whereby information is encoded by molecular alterations in the interaction between the...

A photovoltaic device that consists of multiple p-n junctions to produce a greater efficiency when in use than that of...

A short length of optical fiber permanently fixed to a component and used to couple power between it and the transmission...

A laser in which stimulated emission is triggered by the absorption by electrons of light from an auxiliary source such as a...

A term referring to an optical force field used to trap and stabilize particles acted upon by a force such as laser light.

An optical tooling instrument consisting of an objective lens, a focusing lens, an optical micrometer, a reticle and an...

A wave that is guided by the interface between two different media or by a refractive index gradient in the medium. The...

Calorimetry is a branch of science that involves the measurement of heat flow in physical or chemical processes. It...

The fluorographic method whereby the visible image (as opposed to the x-ray image) is photographed by mounting a camera in...

A method of measuring microbending losses in optical fiber by sandwiching a length of fiber between two parallel plates,...

1. A constituent part. It may consist of two or more parts cemented together, or with near and approximately matching...

A plate consisting of fused optical fibers with both surfaces ground and polished, and having the entrance surface curved to...

An optical recording technique that uses light source(s), a beamsplitting cube, light detector(s) and an optical fiber...

A coherent fiber optic bundle made from fibers whose diameter changes gradually along its length. Used to magnify or reduce...

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

With respect to photography, the law stating that the optical density of an exposed emulsion with standard development is a...

An instrument usually consisting of a very long interferometer, 3 to 800 m, and a laser light source for the study and...

A method of erasable optical data storage in which information is stored by visible light, then read by illumination with an...

Equipment that supports microscopic live-cell imaging by managing the gas, media perfusion, temperature and other factors to...

The distance between pupil centers in a two-pupil system, measured perpendicularly to the optic axis.

A plastic used in molded optical components. Styrene elements can be combined with acrylic elements to produce achromatic...

Pyramid error in optics refers to an aberration in the shape of an optical surface, particularly in the context of mirrors....

A device used to detect and measure small amounts of rotation. The rotating object contains a reflecting surface from which...

An expression of the tolerance of decentration of a laser diode from the optical axis: the region around the axis in the...

An instrument designed to analyze the optical effects of color.

Germanium crystal refers to a crystalline form of the element germanium (Ge), which is a metalloid and semiconductor...

Pennwalt's trade name for polyvinylidene fluoride, a material used in the jacket of fiber optic cables where low smoke...

Measure of the interference fringe pattern produced by the forward scattering of light by an optical fiber; the fringe...

Reactive evaporation refers to a process in thin-film deposition where a material is deposited onto a substrate through...

In optical character recognition, the mechanical or electronic transducer used to detect the level of illumination present...

The production of holograms initially from either conventional photographs or incoherent optical equipment.

A device used to control or block a light beam by means of the Kerr electro-optical effect, and other electro-optic devices...

A system of elements which rotates the optical image with respect to the optical axis by a factor of pi radians.

A material that surrounds a fiber optic cable's buffer tubes to prevent moisture from entering if the jacket is breached.

A PIN photodiode is a type of photodetector or semiconductor device used to convert light signals into electrical signals....

The optical phenomenon in which right circularly polarized light transmitted by an active medium travels at a different...

A satellite-borne remote sensing device capable of transmitting images at 10 and 20 m resolution from an altitude of 830 km,...

An infrared-transmitting optical fiber with a hollow core; it can be square, round or rectangular in cross section. Capable...

When a block of glass (prism, window, filter, etc.) is placed into a converging light bundle, it increases the physical...

An imperfection in optical glass consisting of a distinct streak of transparent material having a slightly different...

A measure of an optical system's ability to produce an image which separates two points or parallel lines on the object. See...

Minimum object distance, often abbreviated as MOD, refers to the closest distance at which a camera lens or optical system...

A write-once optical disc storage system in which the optical head reads continuously while writing to check the accuracy of...

Off-axis paraboloid and ellipsoid mirrors are specialized optical components used in various optical systems, particularly...

An optical combiner, in the context of optics and display technologies, refers to a device or component that combines...

The angle between the light input propagation vector and the optical axis of an optical fiber or fiber bundle.

A photodiode detector is a semiconductor device that converts light into an electrical current. It operates based on the...

Optical cements and adhesives are specialized materials used in the assembly and bonding of optical components in optical...

Harmonic generation refers to a nonlinear optical process in which incoming photons interact with a material and produce new...

A type of radiation detector designed to recognize nonlinear optical effects, such as the Raman effect, by means of a...

In physics, momentum transfer is the amount of momentum transferred from one particle to another during particle collision...

In the optical field, a tube to which a lens is fastened for centering.

An afocal optical device made up of lenses or mirrors, usually with a magnification greater than unity, that renders distant...

In an optical data storage system, denoting the optical head's ability both to record information and to detect it for...

A device used in measuring attenuation in optical fiber. The loss caused by the bends in a short reference length of fiber...

The Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor is an optical device used for measuring the wavefront aberrations of an optical system....

Also referred to as fundus photography, ophthalmoscopy is the dioptrical study of the various interior components of the eye...

A catadioptric lens assembly consisting of a Maksutov corrector and a spherical primary mirror.

The transmittance of a point on a photographic negative equal to the log to the base 10 of the reciprocal of the...

A material used to jacket fiber optic cables. It is chemical- and moisture-resistant, but not fire-resistant.

A device using a parametric amplifier inside a resonant optical cavity to generate a frequency-tunable coherent beam of...

A mixed-signal oscilloscope (MSO) is a type of electronic test instrument that combines the capabilities of both a...

A transparent sphere that has an index of refraction that is different from that of the medium surrounding it; used in...

Glass consisting of almost pure silicon dioxide (SiO2). Also called vitreous silica. Frequently used in optical fibers and...

Designed for the function of optical wavefront analysis. Shack-Hartmann camera aberration sensors use a lens array to image...

An image, real or virtual, whose spatial orientation is identical to that of the object. The image obtained at the retina...

A pulsed interferometer that permits the continuous quantitative mapping of the surface deformation of an adaptive optical...

In gradient index optics, a gradient profile in which the index varies in a direction perpendicular to the optical axis....

Micro-optical coherence tomography (micro-OCT) is an imaging technique that is an adaptation of optical coherence tomography...

An instrument used to support optical parts to be cemented, or to be mounted in plaster.

A crystalline material with a high electro-optic coefficient, capable of operating at short wavelengths, with applications...

1. In optics, the ability of a lens system to reproduce the points, lines and surfaces in an object as separate entities in...

A copolymer of styrene and acrylic used in molded optical components; it has a high refractive index and a low coefficient...

A YAG crystal refers to a solid-state crystal made of yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG), which is a synthetic crystalline...

The study of visual perception by the sense of sight.

A technique for confining atoms, molecules or small particles within one or more laser beams. This can be accomplished...

Nanoimprint lithography (NIL) is a nanolithography technique used for fabricating nanoscale patterns on a substrate. It is a...

GaN (gallium nitride) distributed feedback (DFB) lasers refer to a specific type of semiconductor laser based on Gallium...

A femtosecond laser is a type of laser that emits ultrashort pulses of light with durations on the order of femtoseconds,...

Extensive data storage in the form of bits, with the use of high-resolution photographic materials and optics, and generally...

A Pockels cell, also known as an electro-optic modulator, is an optical device used to control the polarization of light by...

Spatially offset Raman spectroscopy (SORS) is a technique that extends traditional Raman spectroscopy by incorporating...

Cold atoms refer to atoms that have been cooled to extremely low temperatures, typically in the microkelvin (µK) to...

A lens blank is a piece of optical material in a raw, unfinished state, typically in the form of a disk or block, from which...

The use of phase conjugation or other methods to increase the power density of a laser beam under adverse atmospheric...

A blue diode laser is a type of semiconductor laser that emits light in the blue wavelength range of the electromagnetic...

A beamsplitter is an optical device for dividing a beam into two or more separate beams. A simple beamsplitter may be a very...

1. A device used to trace out an object and build up an image. One of the most common of these types is video scanning. The...

The method used to measure the index profile of an optical fiber by placing it in an interferometer and illuminating the...

Reflection losses incurred at input and output of optical elements because of the difference in refractive index between...

1. The photosensitive membrane on the inside of the human eye. 2. A scanning mechanism in optical character generation.

A photonic cavity, also known as an optical cavity, is a structure that confines electromagnetic radiation within a certain...

The physical thickness times the refractive index.

Characteristic of an acousto-optic modulator, defined by the overlap integral of the incident light and sound field...

The condition in which the index of refraction in an optical fiber varies as a parabolic function of the radius.

A type of interferometer in which two coils of optical fiber are arranged so that light from a single source travels...

A long-pass filter is an optical filter that allows longer wavelengths of light to pass through while blocking or...

Characteristic of optical analyses that are limited to infinitesimally small apertures. Also called first-order or Gaussian...

The term "embedded laser" typically refers to a laser device that is integrated or embedded into a larger system or...

In fiber optics, a device used to polish a biconic plug to a specified length and surface finish. Also called a polishing...

A variable focal length lens system that retains the object in focus as one or more lenses move as a unit along its optical...

Beam profiling is a technique used to characterize and analyze the spatial intensity distribution of a laser beam. It...

An electro-optical infrared tracker consisting of a beamsplitter, an illuminating source, an image dissector tube and an...

Light that is directed or focused by means of curved reflective surfaces.

Optical phase distortion refers to a phenomenon where the phase of an optical wavefront is altered as it propagates through...

See optical time-domain reflectometry (OTDR).

An impurity-doped silicon detector array sensitive to long infrared wavelengths, installed in optical collecting systems...

A hologram in which the image of an object, or the object itself, is located near the hologram recording plane, for optimum...

A system of optical components designed to increase the diameter of a radiation beam. Usually an afocal system.

Laser annealing is a process that involves using a laser beam to heat and modify the microstructure of a material, typically...

The sine of the vertex angle of the largest cone of meridional rays that can enter or leave an optical system or element,...

Term used to describe an optical surface that contacts the test glass only at its edges.

The production of a block by attaching the optical elements to a plate by means of individual buttons of pitch or other...

A confocal resonator, also known as a confocal cavity or confocal laser resonator, is a type of optical resonator...

A method of optical fiber coupling in which the fibers are ground down to expose their cores and placed together to allow...

Blaze height typically refers to a parameter in the context of diffraction gratings, which are optical devices consisting of...

Sets of paired lines carefully designed to give the most accurate pointing possible for various lengths of sight.

The term perovskite refers to a specific crystal structure commonly found in various materials. Perovskite structures have a...

Also known as ground level. The lowest energy level of an atom or atomic system. A material in the ground state is not...

A unit of optical measurement that expresses the refractive power of a lens or prism. In a lens or lens system, it is the...

An interferometer that functions by first detecting the light striking each aperture and then combining the two detector...

The mathematical evaluation of an optical system to determine and quantify its basic optical properties and image quality...

A plate of electro-optical material that serves to rotate the plane of polarization of a light beam.

A method of producing high-quality plastic optics in large volumes by injecting the heated, liquified plastic at high...

Hyperspectral imaging is an advanced imaging technique that captures and processes information from across the...

In coherence theory, an optical law put forth by physicist Emil Wolf that explains the behavior of light as it travels away...

In an optical waveguide, a mode whose field decays monotonically in the transverse direction everywhere external to the core...

In fiber optics, the glass that is found around the glass core of the fiber, and that has a lower refractive index than the...

An InGaAs photodiode refers to a photodetector device that is constructed using a semiconductor material composed of a...

A device designed to measure linear or rotary motion by detection of the movement of markings on a transparent medium past a...

A blur circle refers to the out-of-focus region in an image captured by an optical system. When an object in a scene is not...

The process whereby a rotating wheel carries grains of an abrasive, suspended in a vehicle, across the surface of the...

A MEMS fiber optic switch is a microelectromechanical system (MEMS) device designed to selectively route optical signals...

In the optical field, a piece of glass to which a lens or prism is cemented. The unit is ground and polished as a whole to...

In polarization-preserving optical fibers, the element used to induce birefringence. The SAP is highly doped to provide a...

The alignment process that makes the optical axes of two related systems parallel to each other. Also, making the optical...

Ion-beam sputtering (IBS) is a physical vapor deposition (PVD) technique used for depositing thin films onto substrates. It...

The area of optics in which the propagation of light is described by geometrical lines (or rays) governed by Fermat's...

There are three types of telecentric lenses: -Image-space telecentric lenses are those in which the aperture stop is...

The technique for measuring the index profile of an optical fiber by scanning the entrance face with the vertex of a high...

Rate at which optical radiation or a signal is varied through the use of a mechanical or electronic chopper. Also called...

Property of a substance whose volume elements differ in composition and optical properties.

A method for measuring the index profile of an optical fiber by measuring the reflectance as a function of position on the...

That property of a substance that determines that all components of volume are the same in composition and optical...

Plasma-enriched deposition or planar magnetic sputtering that offers increased deposition rates in optical thin-film...

A bundle of filaments of optical glass or other transparent materials that transmit only light, not optical images. The...

Mode-locking is a technique used in lasers to produce ultrashort pulses of light with durations on the order of picoseconds,...

Used in computer design for optical systems with common parts and different applications.

One optical element of a multielement lens. See optical element.

Rare-earth elements (REEs) are a group of seventeen chemical elements found in the Earth's crust, characterized by their...

The point on the optical axis of a lens that is the image of the nodal points. For any bundle of rays passing through the...

A concave mirror that has the form of a paraboloid of revolution. The paraboloidal mirror may have only a portion of a...

Epitaxial equipment refers to a set of specialized tools and systems used in the process of epitaxy, which is the growth of...

The perceived brightness of an object being viewed at some distance, especially through an optical instrument.

In a microscope, a space reserved to accommodate an optical filter or polarizer.

A hole filled with dirt such as a polishing abrasive and located in an optical surface. See dig; scratch.

The measured planar or solid angle of related aspects of an optical system with respect to an optical axis.

Micro-optics refers to the design, fabrication, and application of optical components and systems at a microscale level....

The storage of information via optical means, primarily employing a low-power laser to inscribe data on a photosensitive...

The masking of all openings of an optical transform -- except the hole at the symmetrical center -- with a thin wire gauze...

1. The branch of physics that deals with the use of electrical energy to create or manipulate light waves, generally by...

A coherent fiber bundle (CFB), also known as a coherent fiber optic bundle, is an assembly of multiple optical fibers...

A coating that is capable of stopping the condensation of moisture on an optical surface.

Protective material surrounding the cladding of an optical fiber that allows the fiber no play within it.

Signal used in optical transmission systems to generate currents in a detector that are decoded with reference to a...

1. The sector of the Earth's surface registered upon a remote sensing device in a satellite. 2. The amount of space occupied...

Also known as the Wiener spectrum or the noise power spectrum, the optical power spectrum is a fundamental quantity in...

A measurement technique used to determine the spatial distribution profile of an electrical or optical quantity of interest...

The branch of science that treats light as a wave phenomenon wherein light propagation is studied by wavefronts rather than...

A flanged or plain ring with a restricted aperture, located in an optical system at any of several points, that cuts off...

In biaxial crystals, the principal angle that bisects the smaller angle between the optic axes.

A structure consisting of a thin film of liquid crystal sandwiched between light-polarizing filters that have received a...

Also known as light beating. The mixing of two narrowband optical components to produce an AC component in the photocurrent...

Noise generated within an optical communications system link that has both internal (dark current) and external (background...

Ability of a laser to resist variations in output power caused when it is slowly rotated about its optical or symmetrical...

The linear relationship between input and output optical fields for a given optical system or application that allows the...

The optical element that receives light from the object and forms the first or primary image in telescopes and microscopes....

A photonic integrated circuit (PIC) is a compact and integrated device that incorporates multiple photonic components and...

Optical elements, often created by micromachining, lithography or vacuum deposition, that rely on diffraction of the...

Second-order nonlinear optical properties refer to a class of phenomena exhibited by certain materials in response to...

The physical distance, measured along the optical axis, from the object to the image. Also called overall length.

Having properties resembling those of light- waves; e.g., the propagation of waves in the television spectrum.

In optical fiber, bends that are larger than microbends (see microbending), being visible. Generally they are caused by...

An instrument that measures the angle at which a prism can couple laser light into an optical waveguide; used to determine...

Describes incident radiation propagating parallel to an externally applied magnetic field in magneto-optical experimentation.

Thin-film deposition equipment refers to machinery and tools used in the process of depositing thin layers of material onto...

The method for measuring the index profile of an optical fiber or preform by illuminating it coherently and transversely to...

A flat cylindrical device generally used to polish terminated ends in fiber optic connections.

A device that varies the amplitude and phase of a light beam; e.g., from a laser or by sound waves. Also known as a Bragg...

Chip-on-board (COB) lights refer to a type of LED lighting technology where multiple LED chips are directly mounted onto a...

The technology of generating and harnessing light and other forms of radiant energy whose quantum unit is the photon. The...

The imaginary line passing through both the centers of curvatures of the optical surfaces of a lens or mirror; the optical...

1. In fiber optics, a protective material applied as an optical fiber cover that has no optical function. 2. In image...

A dispersion-shifted fiber (DSF) refers to a type of optical fiber designed to minimize the effects of chromatic dispersion,...

A sputtering target is a solid material used in the process of physical vapor deposition (PVD), specifically sputtering....

With respect to display systems, a device that uses an independent light source and a control-layer medium, the active...

A null optic in the form of a concave spherical mirror; used for the test and evaluation of a hyperboloidal aspheric surface.

Self-phase modulation (SPM) is a nonlinear optical phenomenon that occurs when an intense laser beam passes through a...

An optical system having one or more lens or mirror components that have nonspherical surfaces. These surfaces, whether...

A rapid change, as opposed to a long-term drift, of the emission wavelength of an optical source. Chirping is most often...

An optical crystal that possesses a strong nonlinear dielectric response function to optical radiation. A material with a...

In optics, the term image jump refers to a displacement or shift in the apparent position of an image when a change occurs...

A small defocused Galilean telescope mounted in a hole in a door. Viewed from inside through the positive lens, a wide-angle...

Remote inspection refers to the process of inspecting, evaluating, or monitoring assets, equipment, infrastructure, or...

A ghost image that has the reverse lightness relations of the original image. This phenomenon is a common optical illusion...

Multi-axis alignment refers to the process of aligning or adjusting components or systems in multiple spatial dimensions or...

The optically pumped, solid-state laser that uses sapphire as the host lattice and chromium as the active ion. The emission...

A small fiber optic endoscope used in laser surgery.

A device that is designed to modulate a beam of light, usually from a laser source, by acting upon the beam directly. The...

The micrometer-size depressions that store data digitally in an optical data storage medium.

Photonic crystals are artificial structures or materials designed to manipulate and control the flow of light in a manner...

A holographic grating is a type of diffraction grating that is produced using holographic recording techniques. It consists...

A Ti:sapphire laser is a type of solid-state laser that utilizes a titanium-doped sapphire crystal as the gain medium. The...

In optics, degreasers or ultrasonic arrangements used for removing pitch, cement or polishing material from lenses during...

Usually a dielectric coating on glass or plastic optics; a coating that is comparable in hardness to glass itself.

Optoelectronics is a branch of electronics that focuses on the study and application of devices and systems that use light...

In optics, a motion controller refers to a device or system that precisely controls the movement of optical components, such...

Optical fibers fused together to form a solid, vacuum-tight assembly in the form of a slab or rod. Discs or rectangular...

In optical character recognition systems, the identification of a character facilitated by means of known factors governing...

Metrology is the science and practice of measurement. It encompasses the theoretical and practical aspects of measurement,...

In a microscope, the diaphragm located between the Bertrand lens and the eyepiece, which is closed during conoscopic viewing...

Magneto-optics refers to the study and manipulation of the interaction between magnetic fields and light (electromagnetic...

The elongation of a transmitted data pulse through a fiber optic due to the chromatic dispersion of the fiber material.

Nanopositioning refers to the precise and controlled movement or manipulation of objects or components at the nanometer...

A ray that is reflected into the core of an optical fiber from the outer surface of the cladding.

A rangefinder used to determine the height or altitude of aerial targets by means of optical triangulation. The device...

An achromat, in the context of optics, refers to a type of lens or lens system designed to reduce chromatic aberration....

Also termed eye distance. The distance between the vertex of the last optical surface of a visual optical system and the...

Piezoelectric motion systems are mechanical systems that utilize piezoelectric materials to generate controlled motion or...

1. A generic term for detector. 2. A complete optical/mechanical/electronic system that contains some form of radiation...

Optical fiber in which the attenuation exceeds the normally acceptable level for long-haul or data communications use.

A spectroradiometer is a device used to measure the intensity of light at different wavelengths across the electromagnetic...

A reflecting grating ruled on a concave spherical surface that not only disperses the light but focuses the spectrum. The...

A cylindrical lens is an optical component that has different curvatures along its two orthogonal axes, resulting in a shape...

An optical image having a brightly lit background.

A single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) is a specialized type of photodetector designed to detect extremely weak optical...

Also known as single plane illumination microscopy (SPIM), this process was designed for imaging of sensitive samples and...

In astronomy, the relative brightness of a celestial body. Originally a scale from 1 to 6, where 1 represented the brightest...

In an optical waveguide, the refractive index as a function of radius.

An optical diffuser is an optical component or material designed to scatter or diffuse light that passes through it. It is...

An infrared light-emitting diode (IR LED) is a semiconductor device that emits infrared light when an electric current...

An optical experiment carried out conclusively in 1887 that demonstrated that the ether, a hypothetical medium postulated by...

In gradient index optics, a gradient profile in which the refractive index varies along the direction of light propagation,...

A Fresnel lens is a type of optical lens that consists of a series of concentric grooves or steps carved into a flat, thin...

Also called coating jig allowance. That margin on an optical component that is outside the clear aperture for use in holding...

In optics, the Pockels effect refers to the phenomenon where the refractive index of a material changes in response to an...

The disordered, glassy solid state of a substance, as distinguished from the highly ordered crystalline solid state....

In surface height measurement of optics with steep slopes, the use of two short visible wavelengths to synthesize a longer,...

The electron beam tube of a television camera that converts an optical image into a pattern of electrostatic charges and...

A device for measuring linear dimensions. The optical caliper generally consists of two circularly mounted mirrors whose...

Fused quartz and silica are closely related materials, both composed primarily of silicon dioxide (SiO2), but they are...

A custom optic refers to an optical component that is designed, manufactured, and tailored to meet specific requirements or...

Any ray through an optical system that is not a meridional ray. The plane created by a refracted skew ray does not contain...

The apparent luminance of the image as seen through an optical system. This brightness of the image is determined by the...

The criterion maintaining that if light follows a specific path through an optical system, it will, if reversed, traverse...

The fiber optic connector standard for Nippon Telephone & Telegraph (NTT) installations, developed with Nippon Electric...

An opaque shielding device designed to reduce the effect of stray light on an optical system.

A tool of cast iron or another suitable medium used with a slurry of silicon carbide, aluminum oxide or emery for grinding...

A fiber optic device that uses a HeNe laser, beamsplitter, monochromator and photomultiplier to detect trace levels of...

A lens that distorts an optical image.

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

Means of amplifying optical waves whereby an intense coherent pump wave is made to interact with a nonlinear optical crystal...

1. That action occurring when light passes through an optical interface at other than normal incidence, i.e., refraction. 2....

A shaft, spindle or any object generally passed through a workpiece to hold, support or shape a particular piece during its...

A type of fiber optic cable that emits light from its sides along its length.

A device for extracting a portion of the optical signal from a fiber.

A phase screen, in the context of optics and wave optics, refers to a surface or medium that introduces a phase delay to an...

Plasmonics is a field of science and technology that focuses on the interaction between electromagnetic radiation and free...

A device used to measure the focal length of an optical system or lens.

A formulaic description of the linear change of the reciprocal optical dielectric tensor with either stress or strain.

The process whereby the shape of an optical surface is altered by polishing.

An instrument that measures several optical parameters, such as optical power and wavelength, with a single measurement...

The change in the refractive index of a material under the influence of an electrical field.

Optical character recognition (OCR) is a technology that is used to convert printed or handwritten text into...

The position and shape of the image of a point source, as predicted by geometric optics alone. The geometric image is to be...

The point of intersection of the optical axis with any centered optical surface.

Fluence is a term used in various scientific and technical disciplines to describe the amount of something per unit area....

The total scattering attributable to the intrinsic properties of the materials through which an optical wave is propagating.

A frequency comb is a precise and regular series of equally spaced spectral lines, or frequencies, that are generated with...

A type of multiple-pass amplifier in which no optical leakage is allowed until a finite number of passes has occurred; at...

Nd:YAG laser refers to a solid-state laser that utilizes neodymium-doped yttrium aluminum garnet (Nd:Y3Al5O12) as the gain...

A ray that lies in the meridional plane; a ray that lies in the plane that contains the optical axis. A tangential ray.

A device used to measure power loss in fiber optic connectors, cables or systems.

A device in which the functions of optical detector and emitter are combined.

E.I. duPont's trade name for a material used in the jacket of fiber optic cables. It is flame-retardant, thermally stable...

A fiber optic end plate constructed by drawing a bundle of parallel fibers embedded in glass and cutting it into thin...

Fizeau fringes are interference fringes observed in an interferometer, specifically in a Fizeau interferometer. The Fizeau...

1. An optical distance finder that depends on triangulation of two convergent beams on an object from disparate view points....

The use of light to initiate the lasing process. See optical pumping.

In a lens or other optical system, the image of the aperture stop as seen from image space.

The term reflective is an adjective that describes the ability of a surface or material to reflect light or other forms of...

A V-shaped channel pressed or etched into a substrate, in which, for example, optical fibers may be placed to create an...

An imaging process, similar to specific Doppler mapping radar techniques, that utilizes a laser, an optical imaging system,...

A light ray that has had its direction altered because of its traversing an air-to-glass interface at some angle. In an...

An immersion liquid used to treat polarizing filters to eliminate the effects of surface variations and to minimize the...

The face of a cathode-ray tube (CRT) that has a fiber optic sheet attached to its surface. The sheet's fibers are at right...

A type of tubing used to protect optical fiber cables, consisting of a wire spiral of aluminum, galvanized steel or...

A technique used to generate a phase shift between reference and sample light beams. The phase shift can be performed...

1. The sorting of lenses by their color. 2. In an optical system, an irradiance or brightness gradient in the image that is...

The process whereby the number of atoms or atomic systems in a set of energy levels is changed by the absorption of light...

The variation of the electronically detected signal with respect to the scaled version of the classical optical signal...

An optical illusion in which distant objects are lighter in tone and less distinct in outline than those closer to the...

A disc composed of a series of holographic optical elements that diffract light at various angles. When spinning, a raster...

The maximum to minimum range of temperature, pressure, humidity, vibration and biological conditions under which an optical...

In an optical waveguide, that loss attributable to macrobending. Macrobending usually causes little or no radiative loss.

The adjustment of the eyepiece of an instrument to provide accommodation for the eyesight differences of individual...

A wedge in a rangefinder or heightfinder used to displace the image produced by one telescope so that it coincides with that...

An electric arc that is formed in mercury vapor through which an electric current flows. The intensity of the illumination...

A device used to prepare optical fiber end faces; a scribe line made by the cleaver's blade propagates across the fiber,...

In a lens or other optical system, the image of the aperture stop as seen from object space.

The process of adjusting input pixel by pixel at the filter plane to adapt to nondeal phase behavior in an optical...

An optical-quality polymer used in birefringent retarders.

The recording of the information contained in a modulated electron beam onto photographic or silicon resin-coated materials....

A splice accomplished by the application of localized heat sufficient to fuse or melt the ends of two lengths of optical...

Coded image obtained optically with a nonredundant pinhole array imaging aperture.

A scanning probe microscope that analyzes the surface of a specimen by recording the intensity of light as it is focused...

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a class of small, single-stranded RNA molecules, typically consisting of about 19 to 24 nucleotides,...

In a single element, any lack of coincidence between the optical and the mechanical axes. In a lens system, any lack of...

The condition in a multimode optical waveguide in which the relative power distribution among the propagating modes is...

A method for obtaining the optical absorption spectra of solids, semisolids, liquids and gases. PAS is inherently...

1. The angular displacement of the plane of polarization of light passing through a medium. 2. The azimuthal displacement of...

Calculation of peak and average transmission power at a given point along an optical fiber or cable.

A camera mounted on an optical bench with an easel to hold the material to be copied. Magnification can be varied over a...

An arrangement of optical fibers in a bundle whereby the geometric configuration of the input end differs from that of the...

In fiber optics, a material whose properties, usually of transmission, are distinctly affected by the absorption of water...

A form of shearing interferometer that contains a simple wedged (plane-parallel) glass plate with a nonzero optical path...

The use of a specialized optical microscope designed to provide a more three-dimensional view of a sample. Stereomicroscopy...

Certain color centers in the alkali halides have been optically pumped to produce efficient tunable pulsed and...

A device, optical or electronic, that may be joined to a camera so that the operator may perceive the scene as the camera...

Ophthalmology is a branch of medicine that focuses on the anatomy, physiology, and diseases of the eyes and visual system....

An LED (light-emitting diode) is a semiconductor device that emits light when an electric current passes through it. LEDs...

A fiber optic component or system designed in such a way that it can be operated by people without specialized knowledge of...

The field of view (FOV) refers to the extent of the observable world or the visible area that can be seen at any given...

Common name for a variety of adhesives used for lens bonding, fiber optic splicing and other photonics applications. The...

In a visual optical system, the axial distance from the last mechanical surface of the eyepiece to the exit pupil.

A solid with a structure that exhibits a basically symmetrical and geometrical arrangement. A crystal may already possess...

A quantum cascade laser (QCL) is a type of semiconductor laser that operates based on the principles of quantum mechanics....

A laser warning and countermeasure system containing a sensor that indicates the direction of a laser beam, and analytical...

A broadband continuum resonator that confines a wide range of wavelengths. From the optical confinement a single wavelength...

A modulator is a device or component that modifies a carrier signal in order to encode information for transmission over a...

A GRIN (gradient index) lens is a type of optical lens that utilizes a gradient in refractive index across its volume rather...

A class of optical phenomena that can be viewed only with nearly monochromatic, directional beams of light, such as those...

The term gradient-index profile refers to a specific type of refractive index distribution within an optical material. In...

A device for inducing mode coupling in an optical fiber. Also, a device composed of one or more optical fibers in which...

Meta-optics, also known as metasurface optics or flat optics, is a branch of optics that involves the design, fabrication,...

Any arrangement of a bundle of optical fibers that alters the shape of the image. For example, by systematic regulation of...

Fiber optic cable that operates at the 1300-nm wavelength.

An optical system that is corrected chromatically for three colors simultaneously.

1. In detector technology, the long wavelength at which detector response falls to a set percentage (usually 20 or 50...

A galvanometric scanner, also known as a galvanometer scanner or galvo scanner, is a type of optical scanning device used to...

A system that uses a continuous-wave laser to measure the velocity of an object by focusing the laser beam on the object,...

In optics, the total radiant energy incident on a surface-per-unit area. It is equal to the integral over time of the...

An array of optically distinct fibers that are fused into one strand. They are used to keep the resolution efficiency of the...

Optical aberration such that image magnification varies with ray distance from the optical axis in a radial distortion.

Any optical transmission channel used in telecommunications designed to connect two end terminals or to be connected in...

A receiver for optical communications systems consisting of a symmetric binary, pulse-code-modulated transmitter, a...

A flaw deliberately introduced into an optical fiber to prepare it for cleaving.

A molecule that is the mirror image of another molecule. The two mirror-image molecules have the same chemical properties;...

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...

An optical medical instrument that uses an intense, precisely focused beam of light to stop weakened blood vessels from...

Automated optical inspection (AOI) is a technology used in manufacturing processes, particularly in electronics, to...

In a heterodyne optical receiver, the frequency that is the difference between that of an incoming laser signal and that of...

A mechanical or electrical-electromagnetic device for periodically interrupting or blocking abeam of light for a brief known...

A microbubble resonator is a device used in photonics and optical physics for the precise manipulation of light waves. It...

A CCD image sensor, or charge-coupled device image sensor, is a type of electronic device used to convert optical images...

The method for measuring the index profile of an optical fiber by preparing a thin sample that has its faces perpendicular...

An optical instrument used to isolate a narrow bandwidth of optical radiation using a diffraction grating as the dispersive...

Commonly performed in spectroscopy, the optical null process is a method for radiation detection whereby physical detectors...

An optical fiber in which the core is of uniform refractive index.

The angle subtended by two points or lines that are just far enough apart to be distinguished as separate. The ability of an...

The use of photonic devices rather than electronic devices to make connections within and between integrated circuits.

The alteration and reduction of color with the addition of white light. The perceived color shift that occurs as the...

A ferroelectric polycrystalline ceramic material used in optical memories for computers and as a piezoelectric transducer.

Linear optics refers to the study and manipulation of light in a linear and deterministic manner, where the response of...

A quantum well is a structure in quantum mechanics that confines particles, such as electrons or holes, in one spatial...

Chromatic aberration is an optical phenomenon that occurs when different wavelengths (colors) of light are refracted by a...

An optical barcode reader, commonly known as a barcode scanner, is a device that uses optical technology to capture and...

A Laurent polarimeter is an instrument used in optics for measuring the rotation of plane-polarized light caused by...

One or more thin-film layers of optical material deposited on a mirror blank/substrate in order to enhance the way that...

In optics, the changing of the relative curves of a lens without changing its refractive value.

A device consisting of two optical systems in which two signals are simultaneously transformed to produce their spectra, and...

A periodic structure formed by intersecting or superimposed laser beams. These beams can trap atoms in low-potential...

A telescopic system having an eyepiece, a reticle and an objective. The instrument measures wavefront power in diopters.

LiFi, short for light fidelity, is a wireless communication technology that utilizes visible light or infrared light to...

A large tank filled with liquid hydrogen, with a flat window at one end and complex optical devices for observing and...

Also known as an optical diode, an optical isolator is a device that utilizes the Faraday effect to suppress or redirect...

Technique using a fiber optic assembly to illuminate an opaque object and transmit an image back from it without a lens...

A small optical polishing machine intended for polishing the surface of a metal specimen before etching for examination...

Sapphire optical fiber is a type of optical fiber made from single-crystal sapphire, which is a form of aluminum oxide...

A photonic crystal surface-emitting laser (PCSEL) refers to a type of laser diode that emits light from its surface rather...

An autocollimator is an optical instrument used for measuring small angular deviations with high precision. It operates on...

A type of optical microscope that allows the specimen being viewed to be irradiated by ultraviolet, violet and occasionally...

A corner cube, also known as a corner reflector or retroreflector prism, is a type of optical device used to reflect light...

A convex or positive lens that serves to collect energy and direct it into subsequent system optics.

In the optical shop, the process of positioning and marking a blank or lens before surfacing, cutting and edging.

A resonator is a device or system that exhibits resonance, which is a phenomenon that occurs when an external force or...

A solar simulator is a device used to replicate the spectrum and intensity of sunlight in a controlled environment for...

A photorefractive material used in image processing, holography and optical switching.

A process by which high-quality fiber optics are made. See axial vapor-phase deposition.

A telescope lens is a primary optical component of a telescope system that gathers and focuses light to form an image. It is...

A micro-ring resonator is a compact optical device that utilizes the resonant behavior of light within a small ring-shaped...

An optical circuit, either monolithic or hybrid, composed of active and passive components, used for coupling between...

A bundle of optical fibers arranged randomly for the purpose of transmitting energy, not an image.

In passive optical components, loss that varies as the polarization state of the propagating wave changes. Expressed as the...

Also known as amplification. 1. The increase in a signal that is transmitted from one point to another through an amplifier....

The control of free electron movement through the use of electrical or magnetic fields, and use of this electron movement in...

A photographic or electronic recording of an optical interference pattern.

1. In optics, one of the exterior faces of an optical element. 2. The process of grinding or generating the face of an...

Inactive optically, but having the capacity for resolution into forms of opposed optical activity. The term is derived from...

A power loss caused by transverse or lateral deviation from optimum alignment of source to optical waveguide, waveguide to...

A fiber optic bundle split along its length with the ends of the fibers extending separately to illuminate different points...

A semispherical or conical lens created directly on the core of an optical fiber to focus light from a laser into the fiber...

The outer material that surrounds and protects the buffered and unbuffered fibers in an optical cable.

The limited light-gathering area of an optical system. The area is normally restricted to an edge or outer surface of an...

The study of the physics of x-rays, where the x-rays exhibit properties similar to those of lightwaves. Also called Roentgen...

An exciton is a quasiparticle that represents the bound state of an electron and a hole in a solid-state material, typically...

Conductor element for use in integrated electro-optic systems that measures current flowing through it.

An optical instrument used to track and image a test vehicle (target) throughout its flight. The cinesextant frequently...

A highly flame-retardant material used to jacket fiber optic cables, especially on shipboard applications.

In optics, an image is the reconstruction of light rays from a source or object when light from that source or object is...

An optical instrument containing a gimballed sighting telescope, used to measure angular relationships in horizontal and...

A method used in integrated optics; formed by growing an epitaxial layer of active material, removing it from its base and...

A five-sided prism containing two reflecting surfaces at 45° to each other, and two refracting faces perpendicular to...

An optical grating, in the context of optics and physics, refers to a device with a periodic structure of closely spaced,...

A specific type of storage in which the material to be written on is heated above its transition temperature and switched in...

A defect in the cleaved end face of an optical fiber, in the form of a sharp protrusion at the edge of the fiber.

Extreme ultraviolet (EUV) refers to a specific range of electromagnetic radiation in the ultraviolet part of the spectrum....

The phenomenon that can render an optical resonator the equivalent of a semiconductor flip-flop. A bistable device will...

Selective laser melting (SLM) is an additive manufacturing (AM) or 3D printing technology that belongs to the powder bed...

That plane in an optical system containing its optical axis and the chief ray. Also called the tangential plane.

The name of the mixture of liquid and grinding or polishing compounds used in processing optical materials.

A nonlinear crystal used to modulate a polarized beam of light by means of the Pockels effect. A Pockels cell is used as a...

The light-conducting portion of an optical fiber, defined by the region of high refractive index.

1. In a photonic interconnect, the number of detectors in a given area. Detectors spaced too closely may give rise to...

A microdisplay is a miniature electronic display technology that is designed to project visual information onto a small...

Descriptive of an optical fiber having a core refractive index that decreases almost parabolically and radially outward...

The variation in attenuation among the propagating modes of an optical fiber.

An array of active optical devices (modulators, laser diodes and/or detectors), each of whose electrical inputs or outputs...

An instrument used to measure backscatter as well as optical return loss and reflectance within an optical fiber system by...

A family of specialized instruments used by ophthalmologists and optometrists to study a patient's eyes and prescribe...

Laser active elements typically refers to the substances or materials within a laser system that play a critical role in the...

The ratio of the illuminance at the peak of the diffraction pattern of an aberrated point image to that at the peak of an...

1. The direct storage of data as bits in memory using optical systems and properties. The memory makes use of a laser beam...

Broadband dielectric mirrors, also known as broadband mirrors, are optical coatings designed to efficiently reflect or...

A geometric representation of a light path through an optical device; a line normal to the wavefront indicating the...

The ratio of the size of the image of an object to that of the object. The ratio of the linear size of the image to that of...

The use of optical or electronic recording systems to extract information from the terrain, while aloft, for reconnaissance...

A reticle, also known as a reticule or graticule, is a pattern or set of markings placed in the focal plane of an optical...

Optical design and engineering services involve the development, customization, and optimization of optical systems and...

The modification of the spherical surfaces in an optical system to correct for spherical aberration.

In dry etching, a method of characterizing the composition of solid materials such as metal. Atoms in the OES technique are...

Operation in which the dispersion of a pulse limits the distance between repeaters in optical systems. Waveguide and...

A scanning technique in optical character recognition in which an array of photocells is used to scan each character to...

The function that characterizes the quality of an optical system by denoting the modulation and spatial phase shift of the...

The focal length of a lens is the distance between the lens's optical center (or principal point) and the image sensor or...

1. In visual perception, the minimum value of stimulus that can be perceived on the average. 2. In optical detection...

A swept-source laser, also known as a wavelength-swept laser, is a type of laser that rapidly and continuously changes its...

An interface in an optical network that permits an optical signal to pass without changing the optical signal to an...

Mode hopping in the context of lasers refers to a phenomenon where a laser system abruptly switches from one longitudinal...

Convex is an adjective used to describe a surface or shape that curves outward, bulges, or has a rounded and outwardly...

In the context of thin film deposition processes such as evaporation or sputtering, masks are used to selectively deposit...

Adhering material used to glue optical components that transmit in the infrared. It is easily dissolved by acetone.

The formation of transistors, diodes, capacitors, resistors and other electronic elements directly on a flake of silicon by...

The image of a point source that appears as a circle of finite diameter because of defocusing or the aberrations inherent in...

Volumetric imaging refers to the capture, visualization, and analysis of three-dimensional (3D) information from a volume of...

A system for fabricating optical fiber, consisting of a furnace that heats the materials, a polymer coating stage, a...

The noise produced in a photodetector when the photocathode is shielded from all external optical radiation and operating...

An SI prefix meaning one billionth (10-9). Nano can also be used to indicate the study of atoms, molecules and other...

An optical filter so constructed that the density increases progressively from one end to the other, or angularly around a...

Transparent glassy and or crystalline structured materials engineered from inorganic, non-metallic materials via various...

A supporting member used to hold optical parts during grinding and polishing. It also describes the assemblage of optical...

The hardware for reading (and writing in devices so equipped) an optical mass data storage disk.

A photosensitive device used to optically scan and read character data (numbers, letters etc.) and input this data into a...

A process used to control thickness and parallelism precisely during the production of plane-parallel plates. Elements are...

In general, changes in one oscillation signal caused by another, such as amplitude or frequency modulation in radio which...

Custom lapping and polishing services involve specialized processes used to improve the surface finish and dimensional...

An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft without a human pilot onboard. UAVs are remotely...

A cathode-ray tube that increases the brightness or size of an image or forms a visible image from invisible radiation. The...

The relative path difference (or phase shift) traveled between two rays that pass through different mediums from the same...

1. That branch of optics that illustrates the theory in which q is substituted for sin q in Snell's law. Effective results...

A technique used to measure the mode-field diameter of an optical fiber by scanning one fiber past another at a distance of...

The area of optics in which the wave nature of a particle is exploited to carry out very accurate interferometry and other...

A spectrometric instrument that detects radiation simultaneously in multiple channels, sorts it spectrally from the deep...

The end of an optical fiber farthest from the source of illumination.

Description of an optical system in which all the elements are aligned on the same axis.

Observed lengthening in wavelengths of the optical absorption edge of a semiconductor with the application of an electric...

In optical communications, the translation of optical signals into radio signals, lowering their frequency in detection from...

In optics, an octave typically refers to a range of frequencies or wavelengths that spans a factor of 2. In other words,...

A device for measuring diffraction grating efficiency at any angle of incidence, consisting of a reflectometer wherein the...

Sapphire crystal refers to a transparent, single-crystal form of aluminum oxide (Al2O3) known as corundum. It is one of the...

Direct conversion of a photon from one wavelength to a lower energy photon of another wavelength(s) due to inelastic...

Also called color blocking. The formation of a block by making optical contact between a number of optical elements and a...

GigE, short for gigabit Ethernet, refers to a standard for high-speed Ethernet communication, capable of transmitting data...

Free-space optics (FSO), also known as optical wireless communication or optical wireless networking, refers to the...

A system of modular mechanical components for building precision optical systems. The basic equipment includes a variety of...

Pockels cell or dynamic optical retarder in which the electrical field is applied in a direction parallel to that of light...

The ray that passes through the center of the aperture stop in an optical system. It often is called the principal ray of an...

A type of matched filter that responds only to the phase of incoming light; the output has a much greater intensity than...

Optical source intended to reduce bleeding as well as to abet wound or vessel healing through cauterization, used in eye...

The use of a plasma to induce the formation of oxides in the production of graded-index optical fibers.

A very high bandwidth communication line often used in fiber optics.

Any form of lens, optical system (camera, telescope, microscope, etc.), or opto-electronics utilized for the purpose of...

In optics and photolithography, a phase mask refers to a device that modifies the phase of light waves passing through it....

A transparent crystalline substance in which the refractive index of the optic axis (extraordinary axis) is different from...

A lens used in the optical testing of an aspheric surface. It converts a spherical wavefront into one that precisely matches...

In an optical system, the gradual reduction of image illuminance as the off-axis angle increases, resulting from limitations...

In optics, a plane that emits a flux proportional to the cosine of the angle of the normal; dense opal glass is an example.

Thin layers intended to prevent damage to plastic optics.

An optical system used to examine the pharynx.

Spherical aberration is an optical aberration that occurs when light rays passing through a lens or curved optical surface...

The total optical power loss caused by the insertion of an optical component such as a connector, splice or coupler into a...

The total optical power loss in a system. The loss budget is often stated in terms of the transmitted power and the power...

A dial depth gauge graduated in diopters; a lens measure.

An astronomical telescope is a type of optical instrument designed to gather and magnify light from distant celestial...

Ray oriented and assumed to propagate orthogonal to the optical axis

Modified chemical vapor deposition (MCVD) is a technique used in the fabrication of optical fibers. It is a specialized form...

Optical fiber capable of operating at both a shorter and a longer wavelength.

A fiber optic communications system that works on the principles of homodyning or heterodyning. The transmitting laser...

The radiography of small objects having detail too fine to be seen by the unaided eye. The resulting negative, when...

In the context of electronics and optics, an isolator refers to a device that allows the transmission of signals in one...

The Kerr effect, named after the physicist John Kerr who first observed it in 1875, is a nonlinear optical phenomenon where...

Modulation transfer function of an optical element when used for transporting images from a lambertian source such as...

Designation for the fundamental mode of an optical fiber.

Optofluidics is an interdisciplinary field that combines principles from optics and fluidics to create devices and systems...

A photon sieve is an optical device used in the field of optics and imaging. It's designed to focus and shape light,...

A crystal, glass, or quartz slicing and cutting machine is a specialized piece of equipment used in the manufacturing...

A digital camera is a device that captures and records still images or video in digital format. Unlike traditional film...

In an optical rangefinder, the system of wedges that rotate in opposite directions to aid in the detection of deviation in...

A device that detects radiation by utilizing the influence of light in forming an electrical signal. It may be a phototube;...

Technology that corrects the shape of reflective optics; primarily applied in large telescope systems, in order to...

A method in optical character recognition in which a mobile light beam scans the outlines of characters for subsequent...

Gallium nitride (GaN) is a compound made up of gallium (Ga) and nitrogen (N). It is a wide-bandgap semiconductor material...

A near-infrared (NIR) camera is an imaging device designed to capture images in the near-infrared region of the...

The size of the field of view in the object space of an optical system as differentiated from that in the image space...

An optical instrument designed to displace the line of sight in a vertical direction. For submarines and other military uses...

An optical element that measures the phase difference between two components of elliptically polarized light to correct for...

An intensified charge-coupled device (ICCD) camera is an advanced imaging device that combines the capabilities of both an...

1. A flaw in a blank caused by folding the blank's surface during its formation. 2. The change in the direction of a...

A monochromator is an optical instrument used to isolate and select a narrow range of wavelengths from a broader spectrum of...

The fraction of incident light power in an optical modulator that is available to the output beam.

A beam shaper is an optical device or system designed to modify the spatial profile or intensity distribution of a laser or...

A complicated constant linked with the electron theory of the Faraday and Kerr effect. It demonstrates a specific value for...

An optical device used to monitor movement of the human eye.

The capacity of a chiral substance such as a crystal or molecule to rotate the plane of polarized light that is transmitted...

A laser or laser system positioned within an enclosure to prevent dangerous optical radiation from leaving the enclosure.

An ultrafast pulsed laser is a type of laser that emits extremely short pulses of light with durations typically on the...

Pertaining to a device that responds to optical power, emits or modifies optical radiation, or utilizes optical radiation...

An optical instrument designed for the visual examination of the inside of the stomach.

A multilayered thin-film device used to modulate transmitted light in integrated photonic circuits.

The standards of MIL-O-13830 set by the US government relative to tolerable surface scratches and other such defects in an...

The determination of a substance's identity or quantity through the analysis of its optical rotation. For example, the...

A transparent lead-lanthanum zirconate titanate ceramic with optical qualities that can be controlled by applying voltages...

In optics, a shape often given to the leading edge of a projectile. In any side view it appears as a pointed arc, while any...

A discipline that combines optics and genetics to enable the use of light to stimulate and control cells in living tissue,...

A branched fiber optic lightguide that performs both receiving and transmitting functions.

Illumination of hologram facets with a beam that covers only a small portion of the hologram in order to optimize laser...

Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behavior and properties of light, including its interactions with matter...

A relatively hard crystal, highly resistant to excessive energy radiation, that is frequently used for optical windows,...

The removal of material from an optical system to decrease the weight and sometimes the bulk of the system. See coring;...

A spectrograph in which the flux density transmitted through the entrance aperture is regulated by an optical wedge or...

Optical confinement of matter with high field energies intended to induce a stable nuclear fusion interaction.

One of the two principal types of optical glass, the other being flint glass. Crown glass is harder than flint glass, and...

A spatial light modulator (SLM) is an optical device that modulates or manipulates the amplitude, phase, or polarization of...

A crystal-based device that combines and adjusts the intensities of multiple wavelengths of laser light in order to obtain...

A mechanism or device, especially a coating with a refractive index equal to or slightly greater than that of an optical...

Die bonding is a critical process in semiconductor manufacturing and microelectronics assembly, where a semiconductor die or...

The optical phenomenon in which white light dispersed by small particles in suspension appears blue when viewed through a...

In an optical waveguide, the exchange of power/energy among modes.

A retroreflector is an optical device or structure that reflects incident light or electromagnetic waves back to their...

Nondestructive measurement of the delta and alpha of clad optical fibers that involves interferometry with the fiber...

The range of angle or solid angle values by which light may enter an optical system.

In an optical system, the aperture size at which the lens gives its best overall performance.

A viewfinder whose optical system forms a direct image of a subject, as opposed to those systems that use reflectance in the...

A mode that is confined by virtue of a lower-index medium surrounding the cladding. Cladding modes, in the terminology of...

In optics, "mode beating" refers to an interference phenomenon that can occur in laser systems with multiple longitudinal...

An equation that uses the wavelength of light passing through a medium, along with a set of coefficients, to calculate the...

A nonlinear optical process in which the frequency of an optical beam is doubled coherently.

Transparent matter that usually is drawn into a cylindrical, pyramidical or conical shape through which light is channeled...

A phase-modulated sensor is a type of sensor that uses modulation of the phase of a signal to measure changes in a physical...

An instrument used to record rapidly varying currents or voltages. An oscillograph may consist of a cathode-ray tube...

Three-photon microscopy is an advanced imaging technique that belongs to the family of multi-photon microscopy methods. It...

An optical instrument for forming the spectrum of a light source and recording it on a film. The dispersing medium may be a...

A fundamental law of wave scattering theory that connects the extinction cross section of a scatterer to the real part of...

A molecular motor refers to a nano-sized device composed of organic molecules or other small-scale components that can...

The change in refractive index that occurs as acoustic vibrations are transmitted through an optical material.The index...

Holography is a technique used to capture and reconstruct three-dimensional images using the principles of interference and...

The analysis of the properties of radiation, such as light, when acted upon by variations in the atmosphere. Blue and red...

An optical test table made up of two outer layers or "skins'' bonded to either side of a honeycomblike core, usually of...

The measurable leakage of optical energy from one optical conductor to another. Also known as optical coupling.

An astronomical mirror, also known as a telescope mirror or primary mirror, is a key component of a reflecting telescope. It...

A reflecting prism that inverts the image. The image is reflected four times internally and emitted laterally. The prism is...

The effect whereby a light beam is deflected by a birefringent prism when its polarization is changed by voltage applied to...

A method of terminating optical fibers by forming a lens directly on the end of the fiber, eliminating the need for precise...

The material favored for study of interaction of high-acoustic intensities with free carriers. Tellurium is the...

Laws that predict the maximum power output as a function of tube diameter for a hydrogen cyanide laser of a given discharge...

An adaptation by Philips and Sony of their audio compact disc technology for optical disc data storage and retrieval....

A strand of aramid yarn, steel or fiberglass in an optical cable intended to prevent bending or stretching that would damage...

Swept-source optical coherence tomography is an imaging technique used in medical diagnostics, particularly in...

A lab-on-a-chip (LOC) is a miniaturized device that integrates various laboratory functions and capabilities onto a single,...

The darkening of the laser facet of a semiconductor laser diode. It can be prevented by placing the component in a...

The line of vision; the optical axis of a telescope or other observation system. The straight line connecting the object and...

In optics, the conduction of radiant energy through a medium. Often denotes the percentage of energy passing through an...

With respect to color photography, the measurement, at a given wavelength, of the way the color film modulates the radiant...

MTF analysis/measurement equipment refers to instruments and tools used to measure and analyze the modulation transfer...

A type of glass used in near-infrared optical components, in which germanium is used as a cation instead of silicon.

The optical diffraction spectra formed, or the method that produces them, when a light beam is transmitted through a...

A cable backbone used to interconnect local area networks at various sites (corporate offices and factories, for example) in...

The angular width of a radiation beam. With respect to a conical beam of light, it is the vertex angle of the cone. The...

Functional materials refer to materials that possess specific properties or functionalities that make them suitable for...

The point at which infrared transmission is cut off.

A rigid or flexible, concentrated assembly of glass or plastic fibers used to transmit optical images or light. See aligned...

A form of roof prism used to invert an image. The prism has faces cut normal to the optical axis; therefore, the prism may...

The angle measured between the focal surface containing the image and a plane normal to the optical axis.

A device that enables visual tracing of a fiber optic cable to check for breaks and defects by coupling visible light into...

One of the two major types of optical glass, the other being crown glass. Flint glass is softer than crown glass, has a...

Sets of lenses (positive, negative and cylindrical) usually mounted in circular rims suitable for slipping into trial...

A gas laser in which the electrodes are mounted perpendicular to the optical resonator.

The surface of an optical fiber that is used as a reference when joining optical fibers. Although the outermost cladding is...

An aberration occurring in a lens system when one or more of the centers of curvature of the optical surfaces do not...

An imaging process in which the single opening of a simple pinhole camera is replaced with many openings called,...

A fiber optic transmission system in which data can go in only a single direction.

Nonlinear optics is a branch of optics that studies the optical phenomena that occur when intense light interacts with a...

An instrument that uses optical filtration in order to measure the transmittance for a discrete range or specific number of...

A device in which slab geometry internally compensates for thermal-optic distortion; the solid host material -- glass or...

A plate made up of thousands of glass fibers arranged parallel to one another, i.e., in a coherent bundle, and fused...

A terahertz spectrometer is a scientific instrument used to measure and analyze the properties of materials in the terahertz...

An optical instrument used to determine the distance to a target being viewed. Two similar optical systems view the target...

The process whereby optical elements are removed from a block.

An optical element having two principal axes, slow and fast, that resolve an incident polarized beam into two mutually...

A scanner in which a fiber optic assembly replaces a lens system.

A system of Japanese origin that utilizes Fresnel lenses and a fiber optic network to transmit sunlight to otherwise...

A polariton is a quasiparticle resulting from the strong coupling between photons (light particles) and certain types of...

A device used for coding messages and having a fiber bundle that is aligned at both ends and scrambled in the middle, potted...

The fraction of available output from a radiant source that is coupled and transmitted by an optical fiber.

A special-purpose camera used by ophthalmologists to photograph the retina of the eye. The optical system operates through...

1. In optics, the bending of rays away from each other. 2. In lasers, the spreading of a laser beam with increased distance...

An electrowetting display (EWD) is a type of electronic display technology that utilizes the principles of electrowetting to...

A ray that behaves according to paraxial equations; one that lies close to and almost parallel to the optical axis.

Phase distortion refers to a change in the phase relationships between different frequency components of a signal. In the...

Also known as OCT-A, optical coherence tomography angiography is an imaging technique that uses light waves to measure...

An optical fiber that can be used to amplify an optical input. Erbium rare earth ions are added to the fiber core material...

Stress applied to an optical fiber at a constant rate.

The term light field refers to the spatial distribution of light rays traveling in all directions through a given space. It...

Phase matching is a crucial concept in the field of optics, particularly in nonlinear optics and the generation of coherent...

A Kerr soliton refers to a specific type of soliton, a self-reinforcing wave packet, that arises in nonlinear optical...

A type of high-speed cine camera that uses different image paths and a Kerr cell to produce a series of successive images at...

In fiber optic communications, a light source whose beam can be modulated and sent along an optical fiber, and the...

1. A faint second image caused by reflection that is sometimes seen when observing through an optical instrument. 2. With...

A casting consisting of an optical material molded into the desired geometry for grinding, polishing or, in the case of...

An optical wedge in which transmittance or density is a function of the location of the wedge, relative to a specific...

1. Mounting a lens or mirror so that its optical axis is coincident with the optical or mechanical axes of other portions of...

The mechanical centerline through the core of an optical fiber.

An optical system of variable focal length, the focal plane remaining in a fixed position. This result is achieved by moving...

The state of optically excited luminescence. Luminescence refers to the light emitted by excited atoms or ions as they decay...

An optical device that permits the alignment of a gun, cannon or rocket launcher system with its target.

A defect on a polished optical surface whose length is many times its width. Block reek is a chainlike scratch formed in...

An EMCCD (electron-multiplying charge-coupled device) camera is a type of scientific camera specifically designed for...

A material used in the jacket of fiber optic cables.

Directional and coherent radiation pulses that result from an ensemble of coherently prepared states in an optical medium.

An optical system used to collect infrared energy from a scene using scanning optics with a point or line detector, as...

An absorbing coating medium between fibers, used in some fused fiber optic plates to absorb unwanted light. Such coatings...

A manufacturing process used to construct substrates for large optical components. Used with IR materials, planform bonding...

A mode in an optical waveguide whose fields are transversely oscillatory everywhere external to the waveguide. It exists...

Conventional coordinates for optical system analysis, the X-axis being the horizontal, the Y-axis the vertical and the...

A term pertaining to devices (generally optical) designed for use with both eyes viewing through a single exit pupil. The...

An optical cable that is connector terminated. Generally, an optical cable that has been terminated by a manufacturer and is...

A scanning technique in which the optical density of the film being scanned controls the speed of deflection of the scanning...

Two-photon excited fluorescence (TPEF) is a nonlinear optical method that allows imaging of biological cells and living...

Transmission loss in optical fibers caused by packaging processes; it is considered a power-coupling effect from the guided...

Double-clad fiber (DCF) is a specialized optical fiber that features two concentric cladding layers surrounding a core. The...

1. A geometrical arrangement of two or more light beams for use in laser shows, object detection or other applications...

Intensity distribution in the image of an edge. The gradient of the edge-response curve is a measure of the image quality of...

An optical storage product that can be used for playback only.

Attenuation refers to the gradual loss or reduction of intensity, force, or magnitude of a particular property as it...

The angle between a light ray emerging from an optical system and the optical axis of that system.

A semiconductor platelet laser that emits a coherent image by means of plane optical pumping over the platelet surface, and...

1. A piece of glass with plane parallel surfaces used to admit light into an optical system and to exclude dirt and...

A method of polishing an aspheric surface by mechanically distorting the optic while polishing the surface to a perfect...

A transparent crystalline substance that displays the same optical properties (i.e. refractive index) in all directions such...

Pitch, wax, resin or other cement suitable for holding optical parts to a spindle during grinding and polishing processes.

A grating beamsplitter is an optical device that utilizes the principles of diffraction to split a beam of light into...

High harmonic generation (HHG) refers to a nonlinear optical process in which intense laser light interacts with a gaseous...

In fiber optics, the limitation on performance imposed by the system bandwidth rather than the amplitude of the signal.

The application of a constant stress to an optical fiber.

The maximum rate at which temporally disjunct optical signals can be produced or detected.

A CMOS image sensor, short for complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor image sensor, is a type of semiconductor device used...

Broadband radiation emitted by a laser that does not transmit through the optical element. It can be removed by filtering.

To control, by magnifying or reducing, the size of a televised image, either electronically or optically.

A common technique in microscopy, oblique illumination is one in which the object is illuminated by a light source that is...

A sequential scanning device, utilizing a revolving lens, in which the cathode-ray tube image is transformed into a circle...

A technique that uses a solid-state laser and a detector to determine an object's relative distance to the system. The laser...

Quantitative phase imaging (QPI) is an advanced imaging technique used in microscopy to measure and analyze the optical...

The term "Rydberg atom" refers to an atom in a highly excited state where one or more of its electrons are in a Rydberg...

The separation of unpolarized light into two plane-polarized elements by a doubly refracting crystal. When a crystal, such...

A monolithic device containing both photonic and electronic sources, detectors, modulators, etc., on a single semiconductor...

An adhesive used for bonding optical elements or for holding devices.

1. An optical device used for projection of enlarged images of transparencies or lantern slides on a screen. 2. A device...

A system designed with a laser as a light source and a means for producing sound waves extending beyond 100 MHz to deflect...

Left- and right-hand circularly polarized beams that are produced at different velocities by passing plane-polarized light...

Indium phosphide (InP) is a compound semiconductor material composed of indium (In) and phosphorus (P). It belongs to the...

A structural method of optical character recognition, used where the input media are variable, as in hand-written or...

The distance from the final optic within a system to the rear image point of the system. See focal length.

A mirror blank refers to the initial piece of material from which a mirror is made. It is typically a flat or slightly...

The number of bound modes that an optical waveguide is capable of supporting.

The entrance slit, also known simply as the slit, is an essential component in optical instruments such as spectrometers and...

A liquid crystal light valve (LCLV), also known as a spatial light modulator (SLM), is an optical device that modulates the...

The use of retroreflective projection technology (RPT) to project a background image onto a masked object, such as a vehicle...

That voltage required across a Pockels, Kerr or other electro-optic light modulator to retard one polarization electrical...

Also known as RAMP microscopy, random access multiphoton microscopy is a microscopic technique that uses multiple...

A laser in which the transition involved in stimulated emission of radiation takes place between two levels of an ionized...

A low-power telescope placed at the eyepiece of an optical system to increase overall magnification. Most often used to...

Thin-film coatings are layers of material applied to the surface of an object or substrate, typically to modify its optical,...

Production of a repeated image of a transmitted beam through a diffractive optical element such as a holographic card or...

Optical surface damage due to abrasive rubbing. Abrasion damage affects are less than the thickness of the optical coating...

Heat measurement method in which the sample is made part of the interferometer and the temperature increase is determined by...

In optical emission spectroscopy, the reduction in radiant power in the central portion of spectral lines arising from the...

Optical noise refers to undesirable fluctuations or disturbances in an optical signal that can affect the quality or...

Gallium arsenide phosphide (GaAsP) is a semiconductor alloy composed of gallium (Ga), arsenic (As), and phosphorus (P). It...

The diffraction pattern of a source such as a light-emitting diode, injection laser diode or the output end of an optical...

Loss mechanisms that degrade the performance of all thin-film optical devices by removing radiant flux out of the specular...

In an optical waveguide, a ray for which geometric optics would predict total internal reflection at the core boundary, but...

The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is a widely used molecular biology technique used to amplify a specific segment of DNA...

A system for automatic industrial process control or measurement, consisting of an optical module for image acquisition, a...

Opsins are a group of light-sensitive proteins found primarily in the retinas of vertebrate and invertebrate eyes, as well...

An optical wedge of very small angles that admits light while sealing out moisture and dirt and that may be rotated to...

Ultraviolet (UV) fiber optics refers to optical fibers that are designed and optimized for the transmission of ultraviolet...

Stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy (STORM) is a superresolution microscopy technique that enables imaging of...

A light valve that uses a crystal as the control layer medium and that operates on the principle of the electro-optic effect.

A lamp used in projection that is made with a reflector built into the bulb, normally by coating a portion of its interior...

A lateral shearing interferometer is an optical device used in interferometry to measure phase differences between two beams...

That point in the electromagnetic spectrum at which an optical system focuses the most chemically effective rays.

A prism is a geometric optical element with flat, polished surfaces that refract light. It is typically a solid, transparent...

An antireflection coating (AR coating) is a thin film or coating applied to optical surfaces, such as lenses or windows, to...

Derivative of the half-tone screen process involving the fabrication of a binary pulse-width modulated copy of the...

An optical matrix that does not require perfection in both states of the crosspoint, so that all the optical switches can be...

A laser that distributes its output power among two, three or four optical fibers simultaneously.

An organizational method used in optical design computer programs. The technique produces one number (merit function) to...

Equipment dependent on the effects of a vacuum. The principal applications in optics are in the coating of lenses and...

An electro-optic system using, in general form, an evacuated glass envelope with a semitransparent photocathode at one end...

An instrument used to print an optical image on a specially treated paper. Light and dark portions of the original image are...

An interferometric method for describing the surface shape of large coated or uncoated optical flats. The procedure uses a...

The optical Fourier transform is a mathematical operation applied to optical signals that involves transforming a spatial...

A camera lens, used in macrophotography, that is designed and corrected to produce optimum definition of a nearby object...

A fiber optic connector or splice that mates two multifiber cables, optically aligning all of the individual fibers...

A diffraction grating is an optical component consisting of a surface with a periodic structure of equally spaced, parallel...

A narrow linewidth optically transmissive or reflective component intended for use with a highly monochromatic or single...

Irregularities and disturbances in the atmosphere that are of particular interest because they induce random temporal and...

In Stimulated Brillouin Scattering (SBS), an incident photon (usually laser light) interacts with acoustic phonons in a...

An optical system with object and image points at infinity. Literally, "without a focal length."

The optical energy transfer between ions of differing atoms.

An optical assembly refers to a collection of optical components that are carefully arranged and aligned to perform a...

Optical switching refers to the process of controlling the routing or transmission of optical signals within a network using...

A cable assembly containing both optical fibers and copper electrical conductors in the same jacket.

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

Magnetorheological finishing (MRF) is a precision optics polishing technique used for shaping and finishing optical surfaces...

The process by which an atomic system changes from one energy level to another by either the emission or absorption of...

Variations in a signal passing through an optical fiber caused by the effect on the pulse of the fiber's material and mode...

An instrument used to test lenses by utilizing the optical transfer function. It consists of a HeNe laser, a beamsplitter...

The radius of curvature that an optical fiber can bend without breaking.

Rayleigh scattering is a phenomenon that occurs when light waves interact with particles or molecules that are much smaller...

When uncontrolled laser energy leaks from a laser cavity prematurely, it causes serious damage to optical components and...

In optics, the light ray leaving a medium in contrast to the entering or incident ray.

Older fiber optic cable that may not be suitable for state-of-the-art applications and that is difficult for suppliers to...

A form of liquid crystal with an appearance of moving, threadlike structures, particularly visible when observed in thick...

A chart on paper or glass containing a series of sets of lines at progressively smaller spacing and used to ascertain the...

A photonic crystal that comprises magneto-optical material such that the optical response of the device depends on the...

An optical clock is a highly precise and advanced timekeeping device that relies on the oscillations of electromagnetic...

Laser light show effects equipment including optics and mechanical devices that reflect, position or distort the laser beam,...

A method of analysis in which a pulsed laser beam is used to heat a particle, producing a plasma, or laser spark. As the...

Calculates the exponential growth of the least stable spatial frequency in a laser beam, and is the numerical equivalent of...

In an optical system having astigmatism, the distance between the tangential and sagittal image planes.

A detector-Dewar assembly typically refers to a combination of a detector and a Dewar flask used in scientific instruments,...

A measure of image quality produced by an optical system. May be specified in terms of cycles per millimeter, referencing a...

A very hard, highly transparent coating based on forms of carbon, used to protect optical components from abrasion and...

The principle that states that optical instrumentation cannot increase the radiance of a source; the radiance of an image...

1. An instrument used to measure the opacity or density of dyes, pigments or dispersed particles that form an image in or on...

A linear positioning stage, also known as a linear stage or translation stage, is a precision mechanical device used to...

A system incorporated into fiber optic data communications characterized by several spatially distributed terminals that are...

A standard for fiber optic telecommunications interfaces, with a 1300-nm data link operating over single-mode fiber at data...

Powder used to produce a smooth optical surface through abrasive polishing. Compounds may produce a surface finish specified...

The process, used with a positive photoresist, in which the photoresist is immersed in developing chemicals while being...

A mirror mount is a mechanical device used to secure and precisely position mirrors in optical systems. Mirrors are...

Any optical device that utilizes diffraction in an image-forming capability. Familiar diffractive lenses are zone plates,...

A method that produces low-loss optical fibers. A glass tube rotates while reactants pass through the tube and heat is...

A filter that separates light into many colors via Bragg's law. Generally refers to a fiber Bragg grating used in optical...

An array of refractive microlenses that are round, square and hexagonal and as small as 15 µm. They are used for...

That process by which radiation spontaneously emitted by a volume of optical materials is resonantly reabsorbed within the...

Photodynamic inactivation (PDI) is a therapeutic approach that utilizes the combination of light, a photosensitizer, and...

An optical lens manufactured to control the transmission of light over a specified wavelength range. Low absorption lenses...

Anisotropic is a term used to describe a material or substance that exhibits different properties or behaviors in different...

A reflecting or refracting surface contained within an optical system.

Directing an optical beam in varying directions by varying reflection, refraction, focusing and diffraction methods.

The value of the distance of distinct vision, minimum focusing distance or near point, divided by the focal length of the...

In optics, the double refraction that is produced when stress is applied to a transparent material. Plastics, which are...

Single molecule localization microscopy (SMLM) is a group of super-resolution microscopy techniques that surpass the...

The lens thickness measured at the optical axis.

A support device in which a column or chamber of air permits the free travel of a mobile part. In optical mounting and...

A fiber optic spectrometer is a device used for measuring the spectral content of light. It utilizes optical fibers to...

A method of producing large volumes of plastic optical components in which powdered or sheet plastic is pressed between...

Chalcogenide refers to a class of compounds containing elements from group 16 of the periodic table, which includes sulfur...

Superresolution refers to the enhancement or improvement of the spatial resolution beyond the conventional limits imposed by...

In a medium of constant refractive index, the product of the geometrical distance and the refractive index.

A configuration or device mounted at the end of a fiber or cable that is intended to prevent reflection.

A profile of an optical component, usually a fiber, in which the core is of uniform refractive index and the cladding or...

An optical element having plane-inclined surfaces. Usually the faces are inclined toward one another at very small angles....

See optical spectrum; visible spectrum.

For an optical table, the amount of displacement that occurs when a heavy load is placed or moved on the surface. To measure...

Laser-powered telephone device for analog communications that employs a vibrating plastic membrane as a transmitter to...

Birefringence is an optical property of certain materials that causes them to exhibit different refractive indices for light...

Rare earth dopants refer to elements from the lanthanide series, also known as rare earth elements, that are intentionally...

A positive lens located at or close to an intermediate image plane. The collector refracts off-axis light bundles, directing...

An optical system that is designed to produce a high temperature in a specified area by the optical direction and...

A nonoptical surface, within lenses and lens mounts, that contributes largely to flare by reflecting light into the image...

In semiconductor physics, the term bandgap refers to the energy range in a material where no electronic states are allowed....

A defect in an optical system that prevents rays from reaching their intended destination; it can be caused by an undersized...

The determination of distance based upon the known size of an object and the size of its image at the image plane of an...

An optical waveguide having a silica core and a plastic cladding.

An infrared camera, also known as a thermal imaging camera or IR camera, is a device that captures and visualizes the...

Discipline within optical physics that addresses sound vibration, phonon effects and their influencing behavior within...

An optical waveguide that will allow more than one bound mode to propagate.

Dichroism refers to the property of certain materials to exhibit different colors or absorbance of light depending on the...

Integration time, in the context of optics, imaging systems, and sensor technology, refers to the duration over which a...

A type of internal photonic connection in an integrated circuit in which a holographic grating is used to focus light at...

The phenomenon that makes nonlinear the mathematical expression for the electrical polarization of a medium through which...

A specific type of filter designed to reduce the amount of light scattered by reflections from the edges of optical...

In an optical waveguide, that dispersion attributable to the variation of refractive index profile with wavelength. The...

A light-harvesting protein found in the purple membrane of a micro-organism called Halobacterium halobium. The protein...

An optical scanning system found in most computer scanners that can read documents, often in many type styles, and convert...

Also referred to as a funduscope, an ophthalmoscope is a specialized instrument used by ophthalmologists for observing and...

Radiation used to excite an optical or laser material to a higher energy level. See optical pumping.

An InGaAs (indium gallium arsenide) camera is a type of imaging device that utilizes InGaAs sensors to capture images in the...

A scale on an optical instrument that indicates the condition of focus. May indicate the distance to the object or diopter...

An oven or furnace that possesses the design requirements and heat control necessary to anneal glass for the optical...

A reflecting prism that is rhomboidal in shape. It has two parallel transmitting faces, and two parallel reflecting faces;...

In the tolerancing of optical elements, the displacement of the optical axis from the mechanical axis.

In compact disc and CD-ROM technology, the portion of the drive that projects the laser light onto the surface of the media...

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

A straight line connecting the curvature centers of the refracting lens surfaces. In a mechanical sense, a line joining the...

A polarizing beamsplitting prism similar in design to the Rochon prism. However, the Senarmont transmits the extraordinary...

1. The grinding or edging of a lens so that the geometrical center and optical center do not coincide. 2. The shifting of an...

The photomicrographic recording of Schlieren effects, irregular refractions of light from optic surfaces or areas of thin,...

The metal tube that maintains the optical components of a lens in proper relationship. Some lenses are mounted in metal...

Light diffracted by a solid (usually quartz in crystal or fused form) traversed by acoustic waves. If the ultrasonic...

Capability requirement for optical switches for transmission lines to process arbitrarily polarized light because of the...

In gradient index optics, a gradient profile in which the refractive index varies symmetrically about a point.

A homogeneous optical medium or coating that transmits only in particular regions of the spectrum. It is used to change or...

A standard direct-readout vidicon tube linked by fiber optics to an intensifier for increased sensitivity.

A process for the production of optical fibers. A glass bait is rotated in a traversing flame of a reaction burner....

A high-speed motion camera, also known as a high-speed camera or slow-motion camera, is a specialized imaging device...

In a fiber optic guided missile, the point at which the optical fiber pays out from the bobbin on which it is wound.

A flexible fiber cable with a small diameter that transports light from the excitation laser to the target. Used in Raman...

The transmission and reception of information by optical devices and sensors.

1. In color development, the chemical that combines with certain by-products of the development procedure to form a dye. 2....

In optics, the production of maxima and minima by the superimposition of two sets of interference fringes from light of two...

An optical correlator incorporating a binary phase-only spatial light modulator made from an iron garnet magneto-optic solid...

A quantum dot is a nanoscale semiconductor structure, typically composed of materials like cadmium selenide or indium...

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

A state in which an image is distorted by an optical system.

1. The process of following an object's movement; accomplished by focusing a radar beam on the reticle of an optical system...

Optical glass containing zirconium fluoride that results in special characteristics such as improved transmission.

An apochromat, often referred to as an apochromatic lens or apochromatic objective, is a type of optical system designed to...

An optical compensator similar to the Babinet compensator, but which produces a phase-change consistent throughout its...

A technique for detecting and measuring atmospheric pollution, in which an oscillating mirror directs half the incoming...

A device that couples a light source to an optical fiber by projecting an image of the source and the fiber core onto a...

A standard for fiber optic data transmission systems being developed by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and...

A measure of the closeness with which an optical image is capable of resembling the original object. The factors that affect...

Bearing alternate ridges and grooves; corrugated. Said of some optical surfaces.

Phase contrast microscopy is an optical microscopy technique that enhances the contrast of transparent and colorless...

The degree to which the surface of a lens causes an incident ray of light to bend, or the amount of convergence or...

Contains the light or beam path within a laser device. The oscillator uses reflective optical components that are oriented...

A circular lamp or bundles of optical fibers placed around the perimeter of an objective lens to illuminate the object field...

A lens made up of a dielectric material that is capable of influencing radio waves much in the same way an optical lens...

Plasmon ion-assisted deposition (PIAD) is a technique used in thin-film deposition processes, particularly in the production...

A material having refractive indices that can be altered by an applied electric field.

A small incandescent lamp whose intense beam is focused on the optical soundtrack of a motion picture film. The soundtrack...

A laser cavity, also known as an optical cavity or resonator, is a fundamental component of a laser system. It is a confined...

Spectral domain optical coherence tomography is an imaging technique used in medical diagnostics, particularly in...

Optical coatings are thin layers of materials applied to optical components, such as lenses, mirrors, filters, and prisms,...

Photoplethysmography (PPG) is a non-invasive optical technique used to detect changes in blood volume in tissues. It...

A specific form of phase shifting interferometry - commonly referred to as multiple wavelength phase shifting interferometry...

STED microscopy, or stimulated emission depletion microscopy, is a superresolution imaging technique in fluorescence...

The laser damage threshold refers to the maximum level of laser intensity that a material can withstand without experiencing...

The distance between the center of the two concentric circles of an optical fiber that designate the diameter of the...

The decrease in power that occurs when an optical beam or signal is transmitted through a system.

See Faraday rotation; optoisolator.

An advanced technique that allows the detection of one molecule within a crystal or a cell through optical excitation....

An instrument capable of measuring the transmitted or reflected luminance from a very small area seen under a microscope....

Optical fiber that transmits a greater percentage of input light than does high-loss step-index fiber. Low-loss fiber...

A self-healing, index-matching, nonporous coating for optical components that can eliminate production difficulties and...

A lock-in amplifier is a specialized electronic instrument used to extract and measure small signals embedded in noise or...

An optical device that produces a line image lying along the axis from a point source of light; therefore, it has no...

Piezoresistance is a phenomenon in materials science and physics where the electrical resistance of a material changes in...

The process of linking optical fiber end to end.

A package for an optical fiber or fibers that may include cladding, buffering, strength members and an outer jacket.

A method of producing disks for erasable optical data storage. Information is recorded by a laser beam that generates pits...

Essentially, a hologram of a hologram, in which the first-generation hologram is masked with a narrow slit. During image...

A unit of metric measure equivalent to 1 thousandth (or 10-3 ) of the standard unit of optical power which is the diopter (1...

A film applied to a coated or uncoated optical surface primarily for protecting this surface from mechanical abrasion, from...

A type of fiber optic connector consisting of two cone-shaped ferrules aligned by a mating sleeve.

The intersection of the principal plane and the optical axis of a lens.

A permanent joint whose purpose is to couple optical power among two or more ports. Also, a device whose purpose is to...

The angular spectrum approach is a mathematical and computational technique used in the field of optics to analyze and...

A reflection grating is an optical component that consists of a series of closely spaced, parallel reflecting surfaces or...

In a single-mode optical fiber, the wavelength that causes material dispersion and waveguide dispersion to cancel each...

The process of heating and slowly cooling a solid material, like glass or metal, to stabilize its thermal, electrical or...

Noise generated in the flow of current in the photomultiplier, produced by the intentional or controlled application of...

Concave and convex spherical mirrors are types of curved mirrors that have surfaces shaped like segments of spheres. These...

A wide-field camera based on the classic Schmidt optical system used to photograph Earth-orbiting satellites.

A detector and signal demodulator used in optical communications systems to receive a signal and often to translate it into...

Structured illumination microscopy (SIM) is an advanced optical imaging technique used in microscopy to enhance the...

A bulk crystalline optic which permits the propagation of light through a volume of index altered material. The variation in...

A fiber optic sensor is a device that uses optical fibers to detect and measure physical, chemical, biological, or...

An adhesive used to hold optical components in their mounts. It may be a thermoplastic or chemical-hardening substance.

Flow chemistry, also known as continuous-flow chemistry, is a chemical manufacturing process where reactions take place in a...

A mechanical, electrical, thermal or optical detector designed to identify and measure ultrasonic radiation.

A transistor that uses an electro-luminescent source, a transparent base and a photoelectric collector.

A method of determining prism power at any point on a lens. Prism power equals the product of the dioptric power and the...

A straight line, real or imaginary, passing through a body and indicating its center; a line so positioned that various...

Chemical vapor deposition (CVD) equipment refers to a class of specialized apparatus used in the process of chemical vapor...

A type of erasable data storage device that uses a medium deposited on the disc in two layers, each dyed to absorb a...

In an optical system, noise created by mode-dependent optical losses and variations in the distribution of radiant power...

A glass structure from which an optical fiber waveguide may be drawn.

A Peltier cooler, also known as a thermoelectric cooler (TEC) or thermoelectric module, is a solid-state device that uses...

An optical reflector with the reflective coating applied to the front surface of the substrate. This eliminates the ghost...

The current that flows in a photodetector when there is no optical radiation incident on the detector and operating voltages...

The dispersion attributable to the wavelength dependence of the refractive index of the material used in any optical...

The pattern of microwave field intensity that can be obtained by detecting the minute expansion of a microwave absorber slab...

An etalon is an optical device that consists of two parallel reflecting surfaces separated by a precise and known distance....

The number of channels per unit bandwidth handled by a single optical fiber.

A weapon launched from a ground-based platform and controlled by a two-way fiber optic data link. The fiber is payed out...

The area of optics that deals with the interaction of light with a given material. The optical properties of material are...

A machine vision system is an integrated combination of hardware and software components designed to capture, process, and...

An optical resonator in which feedback is accomplished by two parallel planes. In diode lasers, the planes are obtained by...

The range of materials that, unlike glass, may be used in the infrared. Water-soluble salts, such as cesium iodide, and...

The spectroscopic analysis of interference patterns using an electronic imaging tube with a Fabry-Perot interferometer to...

In an interlaced scanning electro-optical system such as television, the system resolution will be less than the number of...

A lens composed of two or more separate elements of optical glass that may or may not be cemented together. The surfaces of...