MECH&AE C286 · MAE C286Applied Optics
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering · 4 units · Graduate courses (200-299)
Fundamental principles of optical systems. Geometric optics and aberration theory. Diffraction and interference. Fourier optics, beam optics. Propagation of light, Snell’s law, and Huygen principle. Refraction and reflection. Plane waves, spherical waves, and image formation. Total internal reflection. Polarization, polarizers, and wave-plates. Lenses and aberrations, lens laws and formation of images, resolution and primary aberrations. Simple optical instruments, still cameras, shutters, apertures. Design of telescopes, microscope design, projection system design. Interference, Young’s slit experiment and fringe visibility, Michelson interferometer, multiple-beam interference and thin film coatings. Diffraction theory, Fraunhofer and Fresnel diffraction, Fresnel zone plate. Fiber optics, waveguides and modes, fiber coupling, types of fiber: single and multimode. Concurrently scheduled with course C186.
Letter grading.
When it runs
Not on the schedule for any of Fall 2025 through Spring 2027. UCLA publishes only that window, so this does not mean the course is gone — check the official listing.
Requisites
Official UCLA wording
Requisite: Physics 1C.
BruinTree reads · Prerequisite
confidence 1.00 · from textRequires
Everything that has to come before this course, not just the courses named in the requisite above.
MECH&AE C286
- PHYSICS 1CPhysics for Scientists and Engineers: Electrodynamics, Optics, and Special Relativity
- MATH 32ACalculus of Several Variables
- PHYSICS 1APhysics for Scientists and Engineers: Mechanics
- MATH 32BCalculus of Several Variables
- MATH 31BIntegration and Infinite Series
- PHYSICS 1BPhysics for Scientists and Engineers: Oscillations, Waves, Electric and Magnetic Fields
- MATH 33ALinear Algebra and Applications
1 direct requisite. Showing 18 courses over 3 levels; the branches marked with a count carry on past it. Every course here opens its own tree.
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What this course is a requisite for, and what those courses lead to in turn.
No course in the catalog lists this as a requisite.