Abstract
One of the best known properties of light is that it diffracts, bending or spreading around objects that lie in its path. A familiar example is when a collimated beam of light passes through a small aperture in an opaque barrier. If the aperture is large, the light emerges as a beam with the same radius as that of the aperture. But if the size of the aperture is similar to the wavelength of the incident light, the emerging light flares out from the aperture and forms a diffraction pattern whereby the intensity of the transmitted light has a broad central peak.