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695 terms
Photonics Dictionary
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beam x
atmospheric attenuation
The reduction in luminance of a light beam due to absorption and scattering as it passes through the atmosphere.
atmospheric turbulence
Irregularities and disturbances in the atmosphere that are of particular interest because they induce random temporal and spatial phase and amplitude fluctuations that destroy the optical quality and...
attenuated total reflectance spectroscopy
Attenuated total reflectance (ATR) spectroscopy is a technique used in analytical chemistry to obtain IR spectra of samples. It is particularly useful for analyzing solid and liquid samples without...
autocollimating spectrograph
A spectrograph in which the refracted beam returns almost along the path traveled by the incident beam, and is brought to a focus by the lens that collimates the incident beam.
autocollimator
An autocollimator is an optical instrument used for measuring small angular deviations with high precision. It operates on the principle of autocollimation, where a light source is directed onto a...
autostigmatic microscope
A microscope to which a beamsplitter and illuminated reticle have been added to measure the radius of curvature of a spherical surface by locating both surface and center and calculating the distance...
axicon
An axicon is a type of optical component characterized by its conical shape and its ability to transform a collimated Gaussian beam of light into a ring-shaped beam with a gradually increasing...
b integral
Calculates the exponential growth of the least stable spatial frequency in a laser beam, and is the numerical equivalent of the nonlinear phase shift along the laser system's optical axis.
backscatter
Backscatter refers to the phenomenon in which radiation or waves are scattered backward, opposite to the direction of the incident beam. This occurs when the incident radiation encounters a target or...
backward-wave oscillator
An amplifying device with a wide tuning range in which an electron gun sends a beam of electrons into a slow-wave structure. The electron beam and the electromagnetic wave move in opposite directions...
ball lens
A ball lens is a small, spherical optical component typically made of glass or other transparent materials. It is characterized by its spherical shape, with both its front and back surfaces forming...
BDS
beam-delivery system
beta fluorography
The use of a short-duration electron beam to record high-speed events that occur in microscopic objects made of materials that emit visible fluorescence during electron bombardment. The method is...
bidirectional reflectance distribution function
Unified notation for specification of reflectance in terms of both incident- and reflected-beam geometry; i.e., the ratio of reflected radiance in direction toward the viewer to the irradiance in...
Billet's split lens
An experimental lens used to produce interference fringes. A positive lens is cut into halves along its center, and the halves are separated. This produces a double image of a slit source set...
bispheric condenser
->
dark-field condenser
A condenser that forms a hollow cone-shaped beam of light with its focal point in the plane of the specimen. If it is used with an objective having a numerical aperture lower than the minimum...
bistability
->
optical bistability
The phenomenon that can render an optical resonator the equivalent of a semiconductor flip-flop. A bistable device will remain stable in two optical states, one of high transmission and another of...
blanking
The process by which the raster beam in a video tube is cut off during the retracing and sync periods.
Bragg cell
->
acousto-optic modulator
An acousto-optic modulator (AOM) is a device that utilizes the acousto-optic effect to modulate the amplitude, phase, frequency, or polarization of a laser beam or other coherent light source. It...
Bragg method of crystal analysis
A technique in which a beam of x-rays is directed against a crystal, the atoms of which, because of their lattice arrangement, reflect the ray in the same way as a series of plane surfaces. If the...
Bragg spectrometer
->
ionization spectrometer
Also known as the Bragg spectrometer. A system used for the x-ray analysis of crystal structure. In the instrument, a homogeneous beam of x-rays is directed on the known face of a crystal and the...
Bragg's law
The law expressing the condition under which a crystal will reflect a beam of x-rays with the greatest amount of distinction or resolution and, at the same time, denoting the angle at which the...
Brillouin microscopy
Brillouin microscopy is a non-invasive imaging technique that utilizes Brillouin scattering to measure the mechanical properties of materials at the microscale. This advanced optical technique...
BUF
beam utilization factor
cadmium sulfide
An inorganic compound, yellow to orange in color, that fluoresces strongly enough when bombarded by a high-current-density electron beam to be used as a high-intensity light source.
CAIBE
chemical-assisted ion-beam etching
calcite interference microscope
A microscope that allows examination of a small crystal and conveniently provides linearly polarized object and reference beams so that, by suitable orientation of an anisotropic crystal, the optical...
calligraphic imager
->
stroke pattern
The pattern formed by a character generation cathode-ray tube system, in which the characters are composed of a sequence of line segments (strokes) generated by the electron beam motion with time...
camera tube
The electron beam tube of a television camera that converts an optical image into a pattern of electrostatic charges and then scans the pattern to produce a corresponding electronic signal for...
camera tube target
The storage surface of an electron beam tube that is scanned by an electron beam to generate an output-signal current corresponding to the charge-density pattern stored.
cantilever
A projecting beam or other structure supported only at one end.
carcinotron
->
backward-wave oscillator
An amplifying device with a wide tuning range in which an electron gun sends a beam of electrons into a slow-wave structure. The electron beam and the electromagnetic wave move in opposite directions...
cascade tube
An instrument consisting of a high-voltage vacuum tube used to form hard x-rays or high-speed ion beams. By partitioning the tube into separate sections, the total voltage is divided.
cathode-ray oscilloscope
->
oscilloscope
A system in which a supplied signal causes the deflection of the electron beam in a cathode-ray tube, thus forming a visible trace on the phosphor screen of the tube and providing for examination of...
cathode-ray tube grid
->
Wehnelt cylinder
Also known as cathode-ray tube grid or shield. A cylindrically shaped electrode that, containing the cathode of a cathode-ray tube with opposite potential, is designed to focus and control the...
cathode-ray tube pattern
The luminous trace formed on the cathode-ray tube screen by the motion of the electron beam.
cathode-ray tube shield
->
Wehnelt cylinder
Also known as cathode-ray tube grid or shield. A cylindrically shaped electrode that, containing the cathode of a cathode-ray tube with opposite potential, is designed to focus and control the...
cathode-ray tube
A vacuum tube with an electron gun at one end and a fluorescent screen at the other. Electrons emitted from a heated filament are accelerated by a series of annular anodes at progressively higher...
chief ray
The ray that passes through the center of the aperture stop in an optical system. It often is called the principal ray of an oblique beam.
chip-on-board lights
Chip-on-board (COB) lights refer to a type of LED lighting technology where multiple LED chips are directly mounted onto a substrate, typically a printed circuit board (PCB), without the need for...
chirped-pulse amplification laser
A laser whose pulses are expanded, using gratings and optical fibers, before amplification and compressed to increase beam intensity without damage to the optical train.
chopper
->
optical chopper
A mechanical or electrical-electromagnetic device for periodically interrupting or blocking abeam of light for a brief known interval. The three most common chopper types include the tuning fork...
chromophore
A naturally occurring pigment in tissue that may selectively absorb certain wavelengths and can be used to aid in targeting the beam in laser surgery.
circle of least confusion
Best point of focus for an image in a beam of light at the smallest cross section of the beam.
circular-ranging optical coherence tomography
Circular-ranging optical coherence tomography (CR-OCT) is a specialized imaging technique used in medical diagnostics and research to obtain high-resolution cross-sectional images of biological...
circularly polarized light
A light beam whose electric vectors can be broken into two perpendicular elements that have equal amplitudes and that differ in phase by l/4 wavelength.
coaxial gas
A jet of inert gas along a laser welding beam's axis that cools, protects or cleans the work surface.
coded disc
A reticle carrying patterns of various forms that can be rotated in an optical beam to cause variations in the intensity of the beam. It also is used in infrared detectors to scan the object field...
coherence degree
->
degree of coherence
A quantitative measurement of the coherence of a light source; equal to the visibility (V) of the fringes of a two-beam interference test: where Imax equals the intensity at a maximum of the...
coherent anti-Stokes Raman scattering
A technique whereby two laser beams, one at an excitation wavelength and the second at a wavelength that produces Stokes Raman scattering, interact coherently in a sample, producing a strong...
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Photonics Dictionary
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