Photonics Dictionary

Biometrics refers to the automated recognition of individuals based on their physiological or behavioral characteristics. These unique attributes are used to verify or identify individuals, often in...

A matrix-controlled display that has information storage at the display surface, and requires that an element be addressed only once to assure that it is on or off.

An adaptation by Philips and Sony of their audio compact disc technology for optical disc data storage and retrieval. Current capacity of a disc is 0.5 to 0.6 gigabytes of information.

A data acquisition (DAQ) system is a combination of hardware and software used to collect, process, and analyze data from physical phenomena or processes. data acquisition system suppliers...

A type of erasable data storage device that uses a medium deposited on the disc in two layers, each dyed to absorb a different wavelength of laser light. To record data, the lower layer is heated by...

An electromagnon is a quasiparticle excitation that combines aspects of both magnetism and electric polarization in a crystal lattice. Specifically, it refers to a collective excitation of spins and...

A method of erasable optical data storage in which information is stored by visible light, then read by illumination with an infrared source that returns trapped electrons to their ground state....

Information storage on a dielectric medium that represents the data as those spots on the medium having electrostatic charges, forming an observable record of the data.

GaN (gallium nitride) distributed feedback (DFB) lasers refer to a specific type of semiconductor laser based on Gallium Nitride materials and designed with a distributed feedback structure. These...

The global ecosystem dynamics investigation (GEDI) lidar is a state-of-the-art spaceborne instrument designed to study Earth's forests and ecosystems in three dimensions. Developed by NASA, GEDI is...

An electron tube having two electron guns, one on each side of the storage medium, to encode the information onto the medium, and to read and simultaneously erase the electrostatic encoding.

The storage of data as bits in memory by holographic processes. The laser beam is divided into reference and object beams, and bit information is stored as a hologram.

Holography is a technique used to capture and reconstruct three-dimensional images using the principles of interference and diffraction of light. Unlike conventional photography, which records only...

A magnon is a quasiparticle representing a quantized spin wave in a magnetic material. In other words, it is a collective excitation of the spins of electrons in a magnetic solid, analogous to the...

A matrix-controlled display that has no information storage at the display surface.

An optical accumulator is a concept or device that collects and stores optical energy or data for subsequent use. This can be applied in various fields within optics and photonics: Optical data...

The storage of information via optical means, primarily employing a low-power laser to inscribe data on a photosensitive surface as pits or phase differences and to read such data via reflected light...

Optical memory is a type of data storage technology that uses light to read and write information. It typically involves the use of lasers to encode data onto an optical medium, such as a disc, and...

An instrument used for video or computer data storage in which a laser optical head is used to write digital information onto a tape. Depending on the size of the reel, the tape may be capable of...

An erasable data recording and storage medium that uses a laser to heat the crystalline surface of the disc to a certain temperature, at which it becomes amorphous and records a bit of information;...

A method of producing disks for erasable optical data storage. Information is recorded by a laser beam that generates pits on the surface of the disk while it is being cryogenically cooled. Erasure...

A quantum repeater is a crucial component in quantum communication networks, designed to extend the range over which quantum information can be transmitted. Quantum information, typically carried by...

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

A skyrmion is a topologically stable, vortex-like configuration of spins in a magnetic material. These configurations are characterized by a swirling pattern where the direction of the magnetic...

A memory system composed of a stack of holographic plates, a mode-locked laser and a rapid detector array. Ultrashort laser pulses are used to extract information from the stack. In this way, storage...

A cathode-ray tube combined with an electrostatic storage unit that is used to introduce, store and retrieve information translated into electric charge form.

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

An electron tube that stores and visually displays information by means of a cathode-ray-beam-scanning and charge-storage mechanism.

Whole slide imaging (WSI), also known as virtual slide microscopy or digital pathology, is a technology that involves the digitalization of entire glass slides containing histological or cytological...