Diffractive

Diffractive describes phenomena and devices that are governed by diffraction, the bending and spreading of waves as they encounter obstacles or openings. Diffraction arises from the wave nature of light, sound, and other linear waves, and it creates characteristic interference patterns. The effect depends on the wavelength relative to the size of the obstacle or aperture and on the geometry of the setup.

In optics, diffractive effects are central to both analysis and technology. Diffractive optics employ microstructured surfaces, known as diffractive optical elements, to control phase and dispersion. Diffractive lenses and gratings can combine focusing with wavelength-selective behavior, enabling compact imaging systems and spectroscopy. Diffraction gratings are widely used in scientific instruments to separate light into spectra.

Diffractive phenomena also occur in acoustics and seismology, where sound or seismic waves bend around objects, influencing room acoustics, sonar performance, and earthquake studies. The underlying wave behavior is analogous to optical diffraction, though the materials and frequencies differ.

In high-energy particle physics, diffraction describes a class of processes in which interacting color-singlet exchanges produce final states with large regions of the detector that contain no particles, known as rapidity gaps. Diffractive deep inelastic scattering, exclusive vector-meson production, and related processes have been studied in electron-proton and hadron collisions. Theoretical descriptions use Regge theory and, in quantum chromodynamics, models based on Pomeron exchange and diffractive parton distributions.

Overall, the term diffractive reflects phenomena and technologies that rely on the diffraction of waves, whether in everyday acoustics and optics or in advanced particle physics experiments.