ZEMAX Users' Knowledge Base

Sanjay Gangadhara

Sanjay is an Optical Scientist at ZEMAX Development Corporation. He came to ZDC after completing a post-doctoral research appointment in plasma physics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he was fortunate enough to be a ZEMAX user. :-)

Sanjay earned his B.S. in Chemical Engineering & Nuclear Engineering from UC Berkeley in 1994 and his Ph.D. in Nuclear Science & Engineering from MIT in 2003.
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 Articles by this Author

This article describes how to determine the perturbation values assigned by ZEMAX during a Monte Carlo tolerance analysis.

This article provides a summary of the surface and bulk scattering models available in ZEMAX.

How to Model a Phantom Lens

This article describes how to modeled a turreted lens system using the multi-configuration capabilities of ZEMAX. A number of IGNR operands are necessary for ignoring the turreted lens in one of the configurations, and are added with a ZPL macro.

This article describes the use of vignetting factors in modeling a system with fixed apertures. Vignetting factors can be used to determine the size and shape of the beam which passes through the system unobscured. These factors also provide a mechanism for efficient optimization of such systems.

This article describes the implementation of the Mie scattering model in ZEMAX. An example of using this model to simulate scattering in the atmosphere is provided.

This article is also available in Japanese.


This article explains how to model an off-axis parabolic mirror when the source is a finite distance away from the mirror.

ZEMAX File Extensions

This article provides a list of the extensions used by all of the files that are a part of ZEMAX. The necessary location for each file type is also provided. 

This article is also available in Japanese.

This article explains how to use filter strings to identify and isolate specific rays in a non-sequential system. Examples are given which show how to isolate rays that have undergone surface scattering and bulk scattering, as well as rays that undergo diffraction and fluorescence.

The Detector Color object provides a tool to visualize the True Color image of an optical system. This object stores both Tristimulus data and power data, and allows both the irradiance (Position Space) and radiant intensity (Angle Space) distributions to be shown. Quantitative results from the detector may be extracted into the merit function using the NSDE operand. These results can be used both for system evaluation and optimization. A simple color optimization example is given.

This article is also available in Japanese.


This article describes the various models available in non-sequential mode for defining broadband sources. These models fall into two categories: (1) source definitions based on measured spectra and (2) source definitions based on Tristimulus values.