A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word "laser" is an acronym for "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation". The first laser was built in 1960 by Theodore H. Maiman at Hughes Research Laboratories, based on theoretical work by Charles Hard Townes and Arthur Leonard Schawlow.
A speckle pattern is produced by the mutual interference of a set of coherent wavefronts. Although this phenomenon has been investigated by scientists since the time of Newton, speckles have come into prominence since the invention of the laser. They have been used in a variety of applications in microscopy, imaging, and optical manipulation.
Optical mark recognition is the process of capturing human-marked data from document forms such as surveys and tests. They are used to read questionnaires, multiple choice examination paper in the form of shaded areas.
A free-electron laser (FEL) is a synchrotron light source producing extremely brilliant and short pulses of synchrotron radiation. An FEL functions and behaves in many ways like a laser, but instead of using stimulated emission from atomic or molecular excitations, it employs relativistic electrons as a gain medium. Synchrotron radiation is generated as a bunch of electrons passes through a magnetic structure. In an FEL, this radiation is further amplified as the synchrotron radiation re-interacts with the electron bunch such that the electrons start to emit coherently, thus allowing an exponential increase in overall radiation intensity.
A tunable laser is a laser whose wavelength of operation can be altered in a controlled manner. While all laser gain media allow small shifts in output wavelength, only a few types of lasers allow continuous tuning over a significant wavelength range.
Theodor Wolfgang Hänsch is a German physicist. He received one fourth of the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physics for "contributions to the development of laser-based precision spectroscopy, including the optical frequency comb technique", sharing the prize with John L. Hall and Roy J. Glauber.
Amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) or superluminescence is light, produced by spontaneous emission, that has been optically amplified by the process of stimulated emission in a gain medium. It is inherent in the field of random lasers.
A fiber laser is a laser in which the active gain medium is an optical fiber doped with rare-earth elements such as erbium, ytterbium, neodymium, dysprosium, praseodymium, thulium and holmium. They are related to doped fiber amplifiers, which provide light amplification without lasing. Fiber nonlinearities, such as stimulated Raman scattering or four-wave mixing can also provide gain and thus serve as gain media for a fiber laser.
Sound amplification by stimulated emission of radiation (SASER) refers to a device that emits acoustic radiation. It focuses sound waves in a way that they can serve as accurate and high-speed carriers of information in many kinds of applications—similar to uses of laser light.
Francisco Javier "Frank" Duarte is a laser physicist and author/editor of several well-known books on tunable lasers and quantum optics. He introduced the generalized multiple-prism dispersion theory, has discovered various multiple-prism grating oscillator laser configurations, and pioneered polymer-nanoparticle gain media. His contributions have found applications in a variety of fields including astronomical instrumentation, atomic vapor laser isotope separation, geodesics, gravitational lensing, laser medicine, laser microscopy, laser pulse compression, laser spectroscopy, nonlinear optics, and tunable diode lasers.
Oclaro was a US-based business manufacturing and selling optical components. Formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange and a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index, the company is now part of Lumentum (LITE).
Michael Hochberg is an American physicist. He’s authored over 100 peer-reviewed journal articles, has founded several companies, and has been an inventor on over 60 patents. Hochberg's research interests include silicon photonics and large-scale photonic integration. He has worked in a number of application areas, including data communications, biosensing, quantum optics, mid-infrared photonics, optical computing, and machine learning. Much of his work in silicon photonics has been the product of a longstanding series of collaborations with Thomas Baehr-Jones.
Robert Louis Byer is a physicist. He was president of the Optical Society of America in 1994 and of the American Physical Society in 2012.
Paul Bruce Corkum is a Canadian physicist specializing in attosecond physics and laser science. He holds a joint University of Ottawa–NRC chair in Attosecond Photonics. He is one of the students of strong field atomic physics, i.e. atoms and plasmas in super-intense laser fields.
Santur Corporation developed, manufactured and commercialized tunable lasers as well as parallel array devices and photonic integrated circuits for the telecommunications industry. It was established in November 2000 in Fremont, California initially developing and commercializing the tunable lasers for metro and long-haul dense wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) systems. The company had a patented a Distributed Feedback Laser (DFB)-array technology, which enabled the manufacture of broadly tunable sources that have the same performance and reliability as fixed DFBs. Santur claimed to have set a new standard in the telecommunications industry with its technology that features a unique combination of high power, wide tunability, stability, Telcordia GR-468 reliability, and value.
Organic lasers use an organic material as the gain medium. The first organic laser was the liquid dye laser. These lasers use laser dye solutions as their gain media.
Yasuharu Suematsu is researcher and educator in optical communication technology by invention of the Dynamic Single Mode Semiconductor Lasers for actuation and following development of large capacity and long distance optical fiber communications.
Laser communication in space is the use of free-space optical communication in outer space. Communication may be fully in space or in a ground-to-satellite or satellite-to-ground application. The main advantage of using laser communication over radio waves is increased bandwidth, enabling the transfer of more data in less time.
NeoPhotonics Corporation is an American public corporation based in San Jose, California. It was founded in 1996. The company develops, manufactures and sells optoelectronic products that transmit, receive and switch high speed digital optical signals for communications networks, These products include transceivers, tunable lasers, high bandwidth receivers, optical semiconductors, photonic integrated circuits, and 100 gigabit per second and above modules." These are each "cost-effective components that handle massive amounts of data at very high speeds".
