Mehrspaltig

Mehrspaltig is a German adjective meaning “comprising or involving several slits.” The term is used in different contexts, most prominently in optics and in typography.

In optics, mehrspaltig describes an arrangement with multiple slits (N slits) that are typically equally spaced. When illuminated by coherent light, such a multi-slit setup produces an interference pattern with sharp principal maxima. The angular positions of the maxima follow d sin θ ≈ m λ, where d is the slit spacing, λ the wavelength, and m is an integer. Compared with a single slit, the central maximum can be much brighter (scaling roughly with N^2) and the fringe spacing is determined by the slit separation. The observed pattern is the product of a multi-slit interference term and the diffraction envelope due to the finite slit width. Practical experiments use mehrspaltige arrangements to measure wavelengths, calibrate spectrometers, or study coherence and phase relationships.

In typography, mehrspaltig denotes a page or article layout divided into several columns. This multi-column format improves readability and page balance, especially in newspapers, magazines, and certain reports. Column count, width, and gutter size are design parameters that influence the reading flow and information density.

Overall, mehrspaltig describes a concept of multiple parallel channels—optical slits in science and multiple columns in design—where the arrangement of the components determines the resulting pattern or layout.