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.
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“Human knowledge and human power meet in one; for where the cause is not known the effect cannot be produced. Nature to be commanded must be obeyed; and that which in contemplation is as the cause is in operation as the rule.”
—Francis Bacon (1560–1626)