Streak Camera - Operation

Operation

A streak camera operates by transforming the temporal profile of a light pulse into a spatial profile on a detector, by causing a time-varying deflection of the light across the width of the detector. In particular, a light pulse enters the instrument through a narrow slit along one direction. It then gets deflected in the perpendicular direction so that photons that arrive first hit the detector at a different position compared to photons that arrive later.

The resulting image forms a "streak" of light, from which the duration, and other temporal properties, of the light pulse can be inferred. Usually, in order to record periodic phenomena, a streak camera needs to be triggered accordingly, similarly to an oscilloscope.

Read more about this topic:  Streak Camera

Famous quotes containing the word operation:

    It is critical vision alone which can mitigate the unimpeded operation of the automatic.
    Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980)