Talk:Optical chopper

I removed the automatic stub sign, since it is really a stub article. I'll see if I can expand the article sometime. --Arnoques (talk) 22:54, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

The article should mention what the typical opening and closing times of the tuning-fork type and rotating-disk type choppers. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.252.204.129 (talk) 07:42, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Stuff that didn't belong

I removed some text from the article because it was either not about optical chopping or it was out of context:

"The chopper amplifier allows for either a physical quantity to be measured or on the electrical signal from the transducer. In general it is desirable to chop the signal as close to its source as possible because only the noise that arises after chopping is removed by the process. The rotation of the chopper produces a radiant signal that fluctuates periodically between zero and some maximum intensity."

There are also electrical ways of generating pulsed light beams at a variable millisecond intervals. As an electrical alternative to the rotating disc, pulsed light is currently used to grow plants under intermittent artificial light generated using specially designed ballast systems for standard fluorescent light tubes. Because the light beam is interrupted before the light is generated, unlike devices which interrupt the light after it is generated, the electrically pulsed light tubes reduce the energy requirements of pulsed light applications by an amount equal to the percentage of pulsing, so a 50% flickered on-off light stream is made with 50% less energy.

References