quantum optics

Quantum optics, the study and application of the quantum interactions of light with matter, is an active and expanding field of experiment and theory. Progress in the development of light sources and detection techniques since the early 1980s has allowed increasingly sophisticated optical…

…development of a new field, quantum optics. Glauber’s research helped clarify how light had both wavelike and particle-like characteristics and explained the fundamental differences between the light emitted by hot objects, such as electric light bulbs, and the light emitted by lasers. (Hot sources of light emit incoherent light, which…

…a new and vital branch, quantum optics, which is concerned with the theory and application of the laser, a device that produces an intense coherent beam of unidirectional radiation useful for many applications.