Metadata
shorthands: {}
aliases: [Physical optics]
created: 2021-10-24 21:57:53
modified: 2022-01-19 17:01:18
Other name: physical optics
Wave optics is the branch of optics that studies interference, diffraction, polarization and other phenomena for which the ray approximation of geometric optics is not valid.
This is mostly used as an intermediate method between geometric optics (which ignores wave effects) and full wave electromagnetism, which is a precise theory.