Photonics Dictionary: W

A beamsplitting mirror that reflects as a function of wavelength.

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...

A system used for gratings that consists of a concave mirror, a grating and a plate holder mounted normal to the grating to reduce astigmatism and spherical aberration. The mounting yields a...

In the context of electronics and semiconductor manufacturing, a wafer refers to a thin, flat disk or substrate made of a semiconducting material, usually crystalline silicon. Wafers serve as the...

A wavefront refers to the continuous surface or boundary representing points in a wave that are in phase, meaning they have the same phase or position in their respective cycles. In simpler terms,...

For each mode in an optical waveguide, the term used to describe the process by which an electromagnetic signal is distorted by virtue of the dependence of the phase and group velocities on...

A device that consists of two types of mode converters, one of which must be magnetic. It is nonreciprocal because the coupling constants of the two mode converters have a different phase relation...

A waveguide is a physical structure or device that is designed to confine and guide electromagnetic waves, such as radio waves, microwaves, or light waves. It is commonly used in communication...

The magnetic flux that, linking a circuit of one turn, produces in it an electromotive force of one volt as it is reduced to zero at a uniform rate in one second.

An optical filter so constructed that the density increases progressively from one end to the other, or angularly around a circular disc.

An optical element having plane-inclined surfaces. Usually the faces are inclined toward one another at very small angles. Wedges divert light toward their thicker portions, and may be circular,...

A well plate, also known as a microplate or microtiter plate, is a flat plate with multiple small wells or depressions arranged in a grid pattern. Each well serves as a separate container for holding...

Whispering gallery mode (WGM) refers to a phenomenon in wave physics, particularly in optics, where waves, such as light or sound waves, are trapped and circulate along the periphery of a curved...

A wide-angle lens is a type of camera lens that has a shorter focal length than a standard or normal lens, allowing it to capture a broader field of view. Wide-angle lenses are characterized by their...

After putting a thick photographic emulsion on a front-faced mirror, and exposing the emulsion to monochromatic incident light normal to the face, Wiener discovered, upon developing the emulsion,...

1. A piece of glass with plane parallel surfaces used to admit light into an optical system and to exclude dirt and moisture. 2. A particular region of the electromagnetic spectrum that has been...

A technique for reducing data processing requirements by electronically defining only a small portion of the image to be analyzed, all other parts of it being ignored.

In micropositioning systems, motion (most frequently undesired) about the Z-axis.

A polarizing prism consisting of two calcite prisms cemented such that they deviate the two emerging beams (which are mutually perpendicularly polarized) by nearly equal amounts in opposite...

A grazing incidence mirror telescope with concentric conic surfaces having a single common point: a paraboloid-hyperboloid combination with two internal reflections.

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

A Cassegrain telescope having a parabolic primary mirror, a spherical secondary mirror and a zero-power doublet in the converging bundle for aberration correction.