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The numerical aperture with respect to a point P depends on the half-angle, θ1, of the maximum cone of light that can enter or exit the lens and the ambient index of refraction. As a pencil of light goes through a flat plane of glass, its half-angle changes to θ2. Due to Snell's law, the numerical aperture remains the same: NA = n1sin θ1 ...
f-number. Diagram of decreasing apertures, that is, increasing f-numbers, in one-stop increments; each aperture has half the light-gathering area of the previous one. An f-number is a measure of the light-gathering ability of an optical system such as a camera lens. It is calculated by dividing the system's focal length by the diameter of the ...
Aperture. In biology, the pupil (appearing as a black hole) of the eye is its aperture and the iris is its diaphragm. In humans, the pupil can constrict to as small as 2 mm (f/ 8.3) and dilate to larger than 8 mm (f/ 2.1) in some individuals. In optics, the aperture of an optical system (including a system consisted of a single lens) is a hole ...
Focal length. The focal point F and focal length f of a positive (convex) lens, a negative (concave) lens, a concave mirror, and a convex mirror. The focal length of an optical system is a measure of how strongly the system converges or diverges light; it is the inverse of the system's optical power. A positive focal length indicates that a ...
As one example, if there is free space between the two planes, the ray transfer matrix is given by: = [], where d is the separation distance (measured along the optical axis) between the two reference planes.
Gravitational lensing. In general relativity, a point mass deflects a light ray with impact parameter by an angle approximately equal to. where G is the gravitational constant, M the mass of the deflecting object and c the speed of light. A naive application of Newtonian gravity can yield exactly half this value, where the light ray is assumed ...
Beam divergence. In electromagnetics, especially in optics, beam divergence is an angular measure of the increase in beam diameter or radius with distance from the optical aperture or antenna aperture from which the beam emerges. The term is relevant only in the "far field", away from any focus of the beam. Practically speaking, however, the ...
Cardinal point (optics) In Gaussian optics, the cardinal points consist of three pairs of points located on the optical axis of a rotationally symmetric, focal, optical system. These are the focal points, the principal points, and the nodal points; there are two of each. [1] For ideal systems, the basic imaging properties such as image size ...