PHGN 320: Introduction to Optics

Course Description

PHGN 320 covers the fundamentals of optics at the advanced undergraduate level. Topics include ray optics and matrix methods, wave propagation, coherence and interference, Fraunhofer and Fresnel diffraction, polarization and the Jones calculus, and an introduction to fiber optics and lasers.

My Role

As teaching assistant, I ran weekly laboratory sessions for 24 students, covering:

• Michelson interferometry — alignment, fringe counting, coherence length measurement
• Diffraction gratings — resolving power, blazed grating efficiency
• Polarization — Jones vectors, wave plates, Malus’s law verification
• Fiber optics — coupling efficiency, NA measurement, mode structure

I also held office hours twice weekly and graded problem sets and lab reports. One of the most rewarding aspects was developing a new lab exercise on spatial filtering using a 4f optical system, which is now part of the permanent curriculum.

Materials

The course used Hecht’s Optics (5th edition) as the primary text, supplemented with lecture notes on matrix methods for optical systems and a custom lab manual.