Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-physics-2-paper-of-the-university-of-oxford/2017/10/e/solution
Past exam of the physics 2 paper of the University of Oxford 2017 10 e Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-25
At focal length , the stroke maps to a focal-plane width . A practical estimate with two detector samples across that stroke isThe required sensor extent in that direction is . One pixel per stroke would give about pixels across, but cannot reliably encode a stroke's position and contrast as the image moves relative to the pixel grid.
For a precise interpretation of “fully resolve” as sampling the entire diffraction-limited incoherent image, use the optical intensity-transfer cutoff . The Nyquist–Shannon sampling theorem requires . With the circular mirror chosen in 10d,This stricter value retains the full circular-aperture spatial bandwidth; the and estimates use two samples per specified feature instead. An engineering design would provide further sampling and contrast margin. The distinction states the sampling convention rather than treating the order-of-magnitude estimates as contradictory.
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