Photonics Dictionary

Radiation in which the phase relationship between any two points in the radiation field has a constant difference, or is exactly the same in either the spatial or the temporal mode throughout the...

Radiation having waves that are out of phase in space and/or time.

The correlation of radiation between the phases of monochromatic radiation emanating from two separate points.

An ammonia maser is a device that amplifies microwave radiation using ammonia gas molecules in a process analogous to how lasers amplify visible light through stimulated emission of radiation. The...

Attosecond-pump attosecond-probe spectroscopy (APAP) is an advanced technique in ultrafast spectroscopy that allows scientists to study the dynamics of electronic processes occurring on extremely...

A light source that is capable of producing radiation with waves vibrating in phase. The laser is an example of a coherent light source.

Dual-chirped optical parametric amplification (DC-OPA) is an advanced technique in ultrafast laser technology used to amplify femtosecond laser pulses to extremely high energies while maintaining...

A maser that relies on the fact that electrons in orbital motion in high-magnetic fields will emit energy at the cyclotron frequency. The transfer of energy is from the bunching of the electrons by...

A free-electron laser (FEL) is a type of laser that generates coherent, high-intensity electromagnetic radiation by using a beam of accelerated electrons as the lasing medium. Unlike traditional...

Class of organic dyes that emit coherent radiation over a wide spectral range.

A laser, which stands for "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation," is a device that produces coherent and focused beams of light through the process of optical amplification based...

The individual coherent series of lightwaves that defines a quantum of radiant energy. Light quantum is equal to hv, h being Plank constant and v being the radiation frequency in herts.

A maser (microwave amplification by stimulated emission of radiation) is a device that produces coherent electromagnetic radiation in the microwave frequency range. It is the microwave analog of a...

Medical lasers are devices that produce intense beams of light with specific characteristics and properties, which are used for various medical applications. These lasers emit light in the form of...

A microbubble resonator is a device used in photonics and optical physics for the precise manipulation of light waves. It consists of a micro-sized, gas-filled spherical cavity (the "microbubble")...

Optical parametric amplification (OPA) is a process in nonlinear optics where a weak signal beam is amplified by a much stronger pump beam through the nonlinear interaction in a nonlinear optical...

Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behavior and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and its manifestation as both particle and wave phenomena. It encompasses the...

Totally coherent radiation is produced by a purely monochromatic point source. In the real world the energy will have a limited bandwidth and the point source will subtend some angle resulting in...

A laser output that occurs when the cavity resonator Q is first kept very low, using rotating mirrors or saturable absorbers, so that the population inversion achieved is greater than usual. A high...

A spaser (surface plasmon amplification by stimulated emission of radiation) is a nanoscale device that generates coherent optical radiation at nanometer-scale dimensions. It is analogous to a laser...

Radiation similar in origin to spontaneous emission but determined by the presence of other radiation having the same frequency. Because the phase and amplitude of the stimulated wave depend on the...

Directional and coherent radiation pulses that result from an ensemble of coherently prepared states in an optical medium.

A synonym for spatial coherence. See spatially coherent radiation.

The method for measuring the index profile of an optical fiber or preform by illuminating it coherently and transversely to its axis, and examining the far-field radiation pattern.

A high-intensity source of incoherent white light in which a capacitor is discharged through a tube of xenon gas; often used as a source of pumping radiation for various optically excited lasers.