 In the operation of an acousto-optic deflector the power driving the acoustic transducer is kept on, at a constant level, while the acoustic frequency is varied to deflect the beam to different angular positions.The acousto-optic deflector makes use of the acoustic frequency dependent diffraction angle, where a change in the angle formula_52 as a function of the change in frequency formula_53 is given as,

where formula_18 is the optical wavelength of the beam and formula_56 is the velocity of the acoustic wave.AOD technology has made practical the Bose–Einstein condensation for which the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to Eric A. Cornell, Wolfgang Ketterle and Carl E. Wieman.