Quantum Optics Coupling One Atom To One Photon

Stereoscopy ... Many 3D displays use this method to convey images. It was first invented by Sir Charles Wheatstone in 1838...

History Of Optics ... Some lenses fixed in ancient Egyptian statues are much older than those mentioned above. There is some doubt as to whether or not they qualify as lenses, but they are undoubtedly glass and served at least ornamental purposes...

Optical Resolution ... An imaging system may have many individual components including a lens and recording and display components. Each of these contributes to the optical resolution of the system, as will the environment in which the imaging is done...

Sun ... The Sun's stellar classification, based on spectral class, is G2V, and is informally designated as a yellow dwarf, because its visible radiation is most intense in the yellow-green portion of the spectrum and although its color is white, from the surface of the Earth it may appear yellow because of atmospheric scattering of blue light. In the spectral class label, G2 indicates its surface temperature of approximately 5778 K (5505 °C), and V indicates that the Sun, like most stars, is a main-sequence star, and thus generates its energy by nuclear fusion of hydrogen nuclei into helium...

Diffraction-limited System ... Some advanced observatories have recently started using adaptive optics technology, resulting in greater image resolution for faint targets, but it is still difficult to reach the diffraction limit using adaptive optics...

Camera Lens ... While in principle a simple convex lens will suffice, in practice a compound lens made up of a number of optical lens elements is required to correct (as much as possible) the many optical aberrations that arise. Some aberrations will be present in any lens system...

Photonics ... Photonics as a field began with the invention of the laser in 1960. Other developments followed: including the laser diode in the 1970s, optical fibers for transmitting information, and the Erbium-doped fiber amplifier...

Optical Physics ... It differs from general optics and optical engineering in that it is focused on the discovery and application of new phenomena... There is no strong distinction, however, between optical physics, applied optics, and optical engineering, since the devices of optical engineering and the applications of applied optics are necessary for basic research in optical physics, and that research leads to the development of new devices and applications...

Airy Disk ... The diffraction pattern resulting from a uniformly-illuminated circular aperture has a bright region in the center, known as the Airy disk which together with the series of concentric bright rings around is called the Airy pattern. Both are named after George Biddell Airy...

Quantum Computer ... Although quantum computing is still in its infancy, experiments have been carried out in which quantum computational operations were executed on a very small number of qubits (quantum bits). Both practical and theoretical research continues, and many national government and military funding agencies support quantum computing research to develop quantum computers for both civilian and national security purposes, such as cryptanalysis...

Observational Astronomy ... As a science, astronomy is somewhat hindered in that direct experiments with the properties of the distant universe are not possible. However, this is partly compensated by the fact that astronomers have a vast number of visible examples of stellar phenomena that can be examined...

Astrophysics ... Aristarchus of Samos (c. 310–250 BC) first put forward the notion that the motions of the celestial bodies could be explained by assuming that the Earth and all the other planets in the Solar System orbited the Sun...

Hubble Space Telescope ... Hubble's orbit outside the distortion of Earth's atmosphere allows it to take extremely sharp images with almost no background light. Hubble's Ultra-Deep Field image, for instance, is the most detailed visible-light image ever made of the universe's most distant objects...

Perspective (graphical) ... Perspective drawings typically have an -often implied- horizon line. This line, directly opposite the viewer's eye, represents objects infinitely far away...

Quantum Optics ... As laser science needed good theoretical foundations, and also because research into these soon proved very fruitful, interest in quantum optics rose...

Superposition Principle ... In physics and systems theory, the superposition principle, also known as superposition property, states that, for all linear systems, the net response at a given place and time caused by two or more stimuli is the sum of the responses which would have been caused by each stimulus individually. So that if input A produces response X and input B produces response Y then input (A + B) produces response (X + Y)...

Digital Camera ... Digital cameras can do things film cameras cannot: displaying images on a screen immediately after they are recorded, storing thousands of images on a single small memory device, and deleting images to free storage space. The majority, including most compact cameras, can record moving video with sound as well as still photographs...

Holography ... The holographic recording itself is not a plain image – it consists of an apparently random structure of either varying intensity, density or profile. Overview and history The Hungarian-British physicist Dennis Gabor (Hungarian name: Gábor Dénes), was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1971 for "for his invention and development of the holographic method"...

Diffraction ... Richard Feynman said that "no-one has ever been able to define the difference between interference and diffraction satisfactorily. It is just a question of usage, and there is no specific, important physical difference between them." He suggested that when there are only a few sources, say two, we call it interference, as in Young's slits, but with a large number of sources, the process is labelled diffraction...

Optical Engineering ... Because optical engineers want to design and build devices that make light do something useful, they must understand and apply the science of optics in substantial detail, in order to know what is physically possible to achieve (physics and chemistry)...

Interferometric Microscopy ... Non-optical waves Although the Interferometric microscopy has been demonstrated only for optical images (visible light), this technics may find application in high resolution atom optics, or optics of neutral atom beams (see Atomic de Broglie microscope), where the Numerical aperture is usually very limited ...

Molecular Nanotechnology ... A roadmap for the development of MNT is an objective of a broadly based technology project led by Battelle (the manager of several U. S. National Laboratories) and the Foresight Institute...

Optical Illusion ... The Hermann grid illusion and Mach bands are two illusions that are best explained using a biological approach. Lateral inhibition, where in the receptive field of the retina light and dark receptors compete with one another to become active, has been used to explain why we see bands of increased brightness at the edge of a colour difference when viewing Mach bands...

Optics ... Physical optics is a more comprehensive model of light, which includes wave effects such as diffraction and interference that cannot be accounted for in geometric optics...