Photonics Online Resources

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Photonics - The technology of generating and harnessing light and other forms of radiant energy whose quantum unit is the photon. The science includes light emission, transmission, deflection, amplification and detection by optical components and instruments, lasers and other light sources, fiber optics, electro-optical instrumentation, related hardware and electronics, and sophisticated systems. The range of applications of photonics extends from energy generation to detection to communications and information processing.
Optics - That branch of physical science concerned with vision and certain phenomena of electromagnetic radiation in the wavelength range extending from the vacuum ultraviolet at about 40 nm to the far-infrared at 1mm. Now being replaced by the more inclusive term Photonics.
Optical Fiber - A thin filament of drawn or extruded glass or plastic having a central core and a cladding of lower index material to promote internal reflection. It may be used singly to transmit pulsed optical signals (communications fiber) or in bundles to transmit light or ../ImagesNet.
Laser - An acronym of Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation. A laser is a cavity, with plane or spherical mirrors at the ends, that is filled with lasable material. This is any material, crystal, glass, liquid, dye or gas, the atoms of which are capable of being excited to a semistable state by light or an electric discharge. The light emitted by an atom as it drops back to the ground state releases other nearby, excited atoms, the light being thus continually increased in intensity as it oscillates back and forth between the mirrors. If one mirror is made to transmit 1 or 2 percent of the light, a brilliant beam of highly monochromatic, coherent radiation is emitted through the mirror. If plane mirrors are used, the beam is highly collimated. With concave mirrors the beam appears to emerge from a point source near one end of the cavity.
Imaging - A reproduction of an object produced by light rays. An image-forming optical system gathers a beam of light diverging from an object point and transforms it into a beam that converges toward or diverges from another point, thus producing an image. If the beam converges to a point, a real image is produced; if the beam diverges, a virtual image is produced at its apparent source.