airy disks

(noun)

In optics, the Airy disk (or Airy disc) and Airy pattern are descriptions of the best-focused spot of light that a perfect lens with a circular aperture can make, limited by the diffraction of light.

Related Terms

Examples of airy disks in the following topics:

  • Magnification and Resolution

    • These are called Airy disks.
    • The resolving power of a microscope is taken as the ability to distinguish between two closely spaced Airy disks (or, in other words, the ability of the microscope to distinctly reveal adjacent structural detail).

  • Kirby-Bauer Disk Susceptibility Test

    • Kirby-Bauer antibiotic testing (also called KB testing or disk diffusion antibiotic sensitivity testing) uses antibiotic-containing wafers or disks to test whether particular bacteria are susceptible to specific antibiotics.
    • A larger zone of inhibition around an antibiotic-containing disk indicates that the bacteria are more sensitive to the antibiotic in the disk.

  • Complex and Asymmetrical Virus Particles

    • The viral genome is associated with proteins within a central disk structure known as a nucleoid.

  • Minimal Inhibitory Concentration (MIC)

    • MICs can be determined on plates of solid growth medium (called agar, shown in the "Kirby-Bauer Disk Susceptibility Test" atom) or broth dilution methods (in liquid growth media, shown in ) after a pure culture is isolated.

  • Giardiasis

    • They can either remain free within the lumen or attach to the mucosa by a sucking disk.