Abstract

Optical techniques and optical instruments play an important role in many advanced technologies. Optics is also a very mature technical subject. This combination of maturity and application to high technology has created a rather uncoordinated standardization effort. For optical components, the most frequently cited specifications are those developed by the military for procurement purposes. Radiation measurements are divided between the illumination engineering community, spectrophotometry, and laser radiation measurements. Standards for photographic optics have been developed primarily in response to the commercial needs of the manufacturers. Fiber Optics is a growing technology in which standards work is actively being pursued to satisfy military and commercial needs. The demands of the semiconductor fabrication industry for quality optics for very high resolution photolithog­raphy applications has stimulated interest in standards for optical microscopy. The standards writing groups working on optical standards will be identified. The topics of some of the standards committees applicable to various fields of optics will be summarized.

© 1980 Optical Society of America