Starting from the concepts of classical optics, Optics, Light and Lasers introduces in detail the phenomena of linear and nonlinear light matter interaction, the properties of modern laser sources, and the concepts of quantum optics. Several examples taken from the scope of modern research are provided to emphasize the relevance of optics in current developments within science and technology. The text has been written for newcomers to the topic and benefits from the author's ability to explain difficult sequences and effects in a straightforward and easily comprehensible way. To this second, completely updated and enlarged edition, new chapters on quantum optics, quantum information, matter waves, photonic fibres and materials have been added, as well as more than 100 problems on laser physics and applied optics.

Dieter Meschede was born in Lathen/Ems, Germany, in 1954. From his early days on he liked to wander through the world and has thus studied physics in several places including Hannover, Cologne, Boulder, and Munich. He has been professor of experimental physics since 1990. Professor Meschede is now based at the University of Bonn, Germany, where his current scientific interests concentrate on light-matter interactions at the most elementary level, i.e. with single atoms and single photons.

1. Light Rays
2. Wave Optics
3. Light Propagation in Matter
4. Optical Images
5. Coherence and Interferometry
6. Light and Matter
7. The Laser
8. Laser Dynamics
9. Semiconductor Lasers
10. Sensors for Light
11. Laser Spectroscopy
12. Photons -
An Introduction to Quantum Optics
13. Nonlinear Optics I: Optical Mixing Processes
14. Nonlinear Optics II: Four-wave Mixing
Appendix A: Mathematics for Optics
Appendix B: Supplements in Quantum Mechanics