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Physical optics is also the name of an approximation commonly used in optics, electrical engineering and applied physics. In this context, it is an intermediate method between geometric optics , which ignores wave effects, and full wave electromagnetism , which is a precise theory .
Visulization of flux through differential area and solid angle. As always ^ is the unit normal to the incident surface A, = ^, and ^ is a unit vector in the direction of incident flux on the area element, θ is the angle between them.
In geometrical optics, light is considered to travel in straight lines, while in physical optics, light is considered as an electromagnetic wave. Geometrical optics can be viewed as an approximation of physical optics that applies when the wavelength of the light used is much smaller than the size of the optical elements in the system being ...
Solitary wave in a laboratory wave channel. In mathematics and physics, a soliton is a nonlinear, self-reinforcing, localized wave packet that is strongly stable, in that it preserves its shape while propagating freely, at constant velocity, and recovers it even after collisions with other such localized wave packets.
The phase velocity is the rate at which the phase of the wave propagates in space. The group velocity is the rate at which the wave envelope, i.e. the changes in amplitude, propagates. The wave envelope is the profile of the wave amplitudes; all transverse displacements are bound by the envelope profile.
Coupled mode theory first arose in the 1950s in the works of Miller on microwave transmission lines, [1] Pierce on electron beams, [2] and Gould on backward wave oscillators. [3] This put in place the mathematical foundations for the modern formulation expressed by H. A. Haus et al. for optical waveguides.
In physical optics, the Stokes relations, named after Sir George Gabriel Stokes, [1] describe the relative phase of light reflected at a boundary between materials of different refractive indices. They also relate the transmission and reflection coefficients for the interaction.
Dispersion is the phenomenon in which the phase velocity of a wave depends on its frequency. [1] Sometimes the term chromatic dispersion is used to refer to optics specifically, as opposed to wave propagation in general. A medium having this common property may be termed a dispersive medium.