Photonics & Imaging

University of Rochester (New York) researchers have developed custom- designed contacts for people with keratoconic eyes, which are rare but disabling. From the side, the eyes look more pointed or cone-shaped than round. The condition causes people to see halos, and double and triple images. About 1 in 2,000 people suffer from the...

Imaging Technology(TM), a supplement to NASA Tech Briefs published three times a year, contains a special section called Applications. Here's an Insider preview of an Application story in the automotive field in the June issue: Infrared Night Vision Expands What Drivers Can "See" Seven years ago, General Motors (GM) became the...

As noted in the article "Mini CW Lasers Enable Next-Generation Bioinstrumentation" in May's edition of Photonics Tech Briefs (PTB), continuous-wave (CW) lasers have helped advance research in fields such as cell sorting and DNA sequencing. Written by Jurgen Niederhofer, product manager of Newport's Spectra-Physics Lasers...

A high-birefringence optical material is needed suitable for implementation in optical systems. The material also should feature high hardness making it amenable to standard polishing and manufacturing processes, low CTE (coefficient of thermal expansion), low CTRI (coefficient of thermal refractive index), low absorption at...

MIT researchers have developed a new type of laser based on Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) for taking high-resolution, 3D images of the retina. OCT uses light to obtain high-resolution, cross-sectional images of the eye to visualize subtle changes that occur in retinal disease.

A digital beam deflector based partly on liquid crystals has been demonstrated as a prototype of a class of optical beam-steering devices that contain no mechanical actuators or solid moving parts. Such beam-steering devices could be useful in a variety of applications, including free-space...