double refraction

1. 1.

   splitting a ray into two parallel rays polarized perpendicularly

   Synonymsbirefringence

   Broaderrefraction

Questions about double refraction

What does double refraction mean?

double refraction means "splitting a ray into two parallel rays polarized perpendicularly".

What is another word for double refraction?

Close synonyms include birefringence. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is double refraction a common word?

double refraction is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.