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Optical engineering is increasingly used in industrial, scientific, medical, and military applications, among others. Engineers and scientists need to have certain knowledge in order to effectively apply optics to their projects; however, most of them did not major in optical engineering. Their busy schedules do not allow them to spend a lot time to study the details of optical engineering. Their interests are often limited to quickly gaining the most basic concepts and identifying the right optical components, devices, instruments, and approaches for their applications. What they need is an information source that can promptly provide them the very practical knowledge about a specific part of optical engineering. In the past several decades, about ten notable books on optical engineering have been published. Several recently published books are available, e.g. The first three approach the topic in a gradual way with detailed explanations and are excellent textbooks for students majoring in optical engineering, as well as for engineers and scientists who have enough time and interest to dig deep into the subject. Fischer covers optical system design with practical design examples and also addresses basic optics and optical components. Smith is a comprehensive book that covers many technical details about classical optical engineering. Both Fischer and Smith are great references for optical engineers and scientists. However, none of these books discuss lasers, laser optics and devices, and fiber optics, even though lasers and optical fibers are now conventional optical components. Smith devotes a section to optical fibers but treats optical fiber as a bulk glass waveguide; most of the important features of optical fibers are not covered. Basic Optical Engineering for Engineers and Scientists introduces the very practical parts of optical engineering to address the needs of those engineers and scientists who are not specialized in the subject but need to quickly learn something about it for their projects. The text briefly introduces the most basic optics, but most of it describes various optical components, optical devices and systems, lasers, laser optics and devices, optical fibers, optoelectrical devices, optical designs, and optical assemblies. The performance specifications of some optical components that represent current technologies are also provided. This book tries to avoid detailed manual numerical calculations and raytracings because these techniques are complex, time consuming, and often inaccurate. Instead, computers and optical software are used to perform these tasks because computers and optical software are widely available and the results provided by programs are much more accurate than the results obtained manually. There are no proofs or problem-solving exercises. These features are intended to let readers find the content relevant to their interests and get the results they need. This book tries to cover most areas of modern optical engineering but not in depth. Haiyin Sun
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