Photonics Dictionary

An absorbing wedge is an optical device used to control the intensity of light passing through it by absorbing a portion of the light. It is typically used in experiments and optical systems where...

An absorption lens is a type of optical lens that not only focuses or diverges light but also significantly absorbs certain wavelengths of the incident light. This dual function makes it different...

An achromat, in the context of optics, refers to a type of lens or lens system designed to reduce chromatic aberration. Chromatic aberration is an optical phenomenon where different colors of light...

An achromatic lens is a type of optical lens designed to minimize chromatic aberration, which is the inability of a lens to focus all colors of light to the same convergence point. Chromatic...

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...

An acousto-optic tunable filter (AOTF) is a device that utilizes the acousto-optic effect to selectively filter and transmit light based on its wavelength or frequency. It operates by applying an...

Acrylic refers to a type of synthetic polymer material known for its versatility, clarity, and durability. It is commonly used in a wide range of applications due to its beneficial properties. Here...

Actinic glass is a type of glass specifically designed to filter or block ultraviolet (UV) light and other forms of actinic radiation. UV filtering: Actinic glass effectively absorbs or...

Visual acuity specifically refers to the clarity or sharpness of vision, typically measured by the ability to discern the details of objects at a specific distance. It is a fundamental measure of the...

An intermolecular substance that serves to hold materials together. Two types are used in the optical industry: one, which must be transparent and colorless, to cement lenses together; and a...

Commonly known as CR39, this thermosetting plastic is used in the casting of eyeglass lenses because of its toughness and clarity.

An antireflection coating (AR coating) is a thin film or coating applied to optical surfaces, such as lenses or windows, to minimize unwanted reflections and increase the transmission of light...

An aspheric lens is a type of lens whose surface profiles deviate from the traditional spherical shape. Unlike spherical lenses, which have a constant curvature across their surfaces, aspheric lenses...

A device containing two opposed quartz wedges of equal angle, one wedge being movable along its length by a micrometer screw. The wedges are cut so that their fast directions are along, and...

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...

A two-part lens that has a different focal length for each part. Generally, it is used in eyeglasses to correct for both near and far vision.

A piece of glass polished flat on one side, with a pair of polished faces that form an angle close to 180° on the other side, the dividing edge running down the middle of the plate. It is used...

An extended bubble or seed on glass, elliptically shaped and more than one-quarter inch (6.3 mm) in length.

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 obtain a sharp edge on the finished piece.

A convex lens that brings an incident bundle of rays to a focus to produce intense heat at the focus.

An optical material used in place of crown glass to produce lenses with extraordinary correction of chromatic aberrations. Its high coefficient of thermal expansion and its tendency to absorb...

A fiber optic end plate constructed by drawing a bundle of parallel fibers embedded in glass and cutting it into thin slices. These slices are assembled in a plane and heated to produce a...

Chalcogenide refers to a class of compounds containing elements from group 16 of the periodic table, which includes sulfur (S), selenium (Se), and tellurium (Te). These elements are known as...

Chromatic aberration is an optical phenomenon that occurs when different wavelengths (colors) of light are refracted by a lens or optical system, leading to a failure to focus all colors to the same...

1. A device used in chemistry to compare the colors of solutions held in flat-bottomed tubes and viewed along the length of the tube. Often a solid glass plunger is moved along one of the tubes to...

A lens composed of two or more separate elements of optical glass that may or may not be cemented together. The surfaces of the elements are shaped to reduce or eliminate the aberrations inherent in...

An inspection device in which the profile of a mechanical part is projected onto a ground-glass screen at a precisely known magnification so that the shape of the part can be compared with a scale...

Convex is an adjective used to describe a surface or shape that curves outward, bulges, or has a rounded and outwardly extending appearance. In the context of geometry or optics, a convex shape is...

The concave portion of a surface, formed on a blank, on which the disk of higher refractive glass will be fused to form a multifocal spectacle lens.

One of the two principal types of optical glass, the other being flint glass. Crown glass is harder than flint glass, and has a lower index of refraction and lower dispersion. Both types are used in...

The process of forming a lens to a given pattern, or of cutting a piece of glass along the line of scratch.

A cylindrical lens is an optical component that has different curvatures along its two orthogonal axes, resulting in a shape resembling a cylinder. Unlike spherical lenses, which have the same...

Diamond turning, also known as diamond machining or diamond cutting, is a precision machining process used to produce high-quality optical surfaces and components with extremely tight tolerances. It...

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

A diode-pumped solid-state laser (DPSSL) is a type of laser system that uses semiconductor diode lasers to pump energy into a solid gain medium, resulting in the generation of coherent light. This...

Dispersion refers to the phenomenon where different wavelengths (colors) of light travel at different speeds when passing through a medium. This variation in the speed of light for different colors...

A type of glass optical fiber that provides low pulse dispersion over a broad portion of the light spectrum and as a result can operate at 1300-nm and 1550-nm wavelengths simultaneously.

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 than at the edges and is commonly referred to as a concave lens. The most...

When a block of glass (prism, window, filter, etc.) is placed into a converging light bundle, it increases the physical distance to the point of focus. The equivalent air path for that block of glass...

An etalon is an optical device that consists of two parallel reflecting surfaces separated by a precise and known distance. It operates based on the principle of optical interference and is used to...