Features | Photonics Spectra

Features

As the market for photonics has spread into new and varied applications, the number of optical engineers has not kept pace. A growing number of manufacturers are finding themselves dependent on the promise of photonics but without the optical expertise to make it work. This means it's not unusual for an electrical or mechanical engineer to find that ideal solutions involve optics. The development of optical design software now allows engineers to "drag and drop" standardized optical elements or...

Photonics Spectra, December 1998

Optical Networks Seek Reconfigurable Add/Drop Options

The ability to add and drop wavelengths from dense wavelength division multiplexing systems is a key function. Accomplishing this task optically, rather than electrically, is an exciting challenge for photonics lightwave system developers. Optical...

Photonics Spectra, December 1998

Photonics Will Assist Next Lithography Tool

Surely someday will find an end to Moore's Law, which says the number of transistors on a semiconductor chip will double every 18 months. Pundits have been predicting an end to this frenzied advancement in circuit density for some time, but progress...

Photonics Spectra, December 1998

Photonics-Based Technologies Improve Semiconductor Yield

The silicon wafer, the basic unit of material in the semiconductor industry, encounters a range of processing techniques, such as crystal growth, ion implantation, film deposition, lithography, etch, metal deposition and polish. Multiple wafers are...

Photonics Spectra, December 1998

Evidence Analysis:

For years, forensic scientists relied on chemical tests and microscopes to examine evidence gathered at crime scenes. Such techniques often provided inconclusive results or resulted in the destruction or contamination of evidence. By the mid 80s,...

Photonics Spectra, November 1998

Information Processing:

The days when police officers snapped instant Polaroid photos in domestic abuse cases or spent hours thumbing through fingerprint cards soon may be over. That's because an increasing number of law enforcement agencies have started outfitting their...

Photonics Spectra, November 1998

Liquid Mirrors Offer a High Quality, Low Cost Alternative to Glass

Scientists have long known that if you spin a liquid, its surface takes the shape of a paraboloid, a great shape for a mirror. Although well known, the concept was never taken seriously because early attempts to make mirrors by spinning a liquid...

Photonics Spectra, November 1998

Nd:YAG Lasers:

The Nd:YAG laser crystal was developed in the 1960s, not long after the discovery of the ruby laser. Its combination of high gain, narrow linewidth, low threshold and physical properties makes it a very versatile laser material and a variety of...

Photonics Spectra, November 1998

Seeing the Unseen:

A teenage boy who had been working inside a garage heard his dog barking and the sounds of a car door slamming outside. The boy left the garage and noticed an orange Datsun station wagon parked across the road, an unfamiliar vehicle in the Orange...

Photonics Spectra, November 1998

Solving the Signal Recovery Problem:

Signal recovery presents potential problems for most researchers and engineers at one stage or another in an experiment. Most often, the problem is either a very weak signal, or a very low signal to noise ratio. A common example is recovering a...

Photonics Spectra, November 1998

The Applications Laboratory:

Explained simply, the application laboratory occupies the space between the esoteric staff in research and the pragmatic folks in sales. The applications engineer has a foot in both worlds, often helping to develop entirely new products tailored to...

Photonics Spectra, November 1998

Laser Analysis:

Valid information about the performance of a laser is the foundation for its proper use. As the variety of commercial lasers increases, users need a greater overall understanding of how to measure their output. Sensors, readouts and test setup can...

Photonics Spectra, October 1998

Laser Safety:

Injuries from lasers are nothing new. Every year since the laser's invention more than 30 years ago, laser technicians, research assistants, seasoned laser engineers and Ph.D. physicists get hurt using these powerful tools. Eye injuries are the most...

Photonics Spectra, October 1998

Photonic Eyes Separate the Wheat from the Chaff

Sophisticated machine vision systems, used in industry for a variety of tasks from wafer sorting to component-defect detection, are making inroads into agricultural and food processing applications as well. By performing tasks usually assigned to...

Photonics Spectra, October 1998

Photonics Analyzes Food Quickly, Efficiently

You are what you eat. Perhaps food analysts have that old adage in mind when they carefully examine the content of their products. What consumer, after all, wants to be a croissant with poorly distributed shortening? Or chicken with salmonella, for...

Photonics Spectra, October 1998

Remote Sensing Guides Farmers to Increased Profits

The US Department of Agriculture estimates the value of field crops, fruits and nuts, and commercial vegetables produced on the 2 million farms across the US at more than $87 billion a year. Although that may seem like a staggering sum, profit...

Photonics Spectra, October 1998

Rules of Thumb:

Scientists, engineers and product developers face daily phone calls and hallway visits from peers who want quick answers to complex questions: "If I improve X, how will it affect Y and Z?" We tend to want to answer these questions with a wall full...

Photonics Spectra, October 1998

Fiber Bragg Gratings Take Control

The ability to write Bragg gratings in optical fiber by simple exposure to UV light is the key to producing a variety of devices. The writing technique is inexpensive, simple, and allows a flexibility in the design of wavelength selective...

Photonics Spectra, September 1998

High-Speed Detectors Provide Fast Measurements for the Lab

High-speed detectors are general-purpose laboratory devices that are useful in a wide variety of high-bandwidth applications. They may be used to provide optical input to high-speed oscilloscopes, spectrum analyzers, network analyzers, or as...

Photonics Spectra, September 1998

Optical Mounts:

In any optical system, no matter how simple or complex, each optical element must be mounted in some way. Furthermore, system performance depends on the precision of the optics, their mounts, and their positioning accuracy. Optomechanical mounts may...

Photonics Spectra, September 1998

Photonics Looks Back:

In the beginning, the Bible says, the Earth was covered in darkness and God said, "Let there be light." Eons later, when the Earth's tenants learned how to manipulate, amplify, and quantify that light they set about examining their own origins....

Photonics Spectra, September 1998

UV Lasers:

Micromachining of medical devices and electronics packaging, permanent "cold" marking of plastics, and microlithography are some of the fastest growing segments of the industrial laser market. For many of these uses, the excimer laser has been the...

Photonics Spectra, September 1998

X-Ray Lasers:

Since the demonstration of the first visible lasers in the 1960s, the prospect of a tabletop x-ray laser has intrigued chemists and biologists alike. Such a laser might finally unlock the many secrets of what goes on within cells or provide...

Photonics Spectra, September 1998

Aesthetic Surgery:

Compared with other surgical cosmetic procedures, lasers are less invasive and enable faster recovery and often superior results. While the cost of a laser-based procedure is often higher than other methods, it has flourished in plastic surgery,...

Photonics Spectra, August 1998

Blood Analysis:

Most blood analysis occurs in clinical laboratories, either within hospitals or at private sites. However, new technologies, including some that use photonics components, are moving this type of test out of the lab and closer to the patient Whether...

Photonics Spectra, August 1998

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