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The nonlinear interaction of ultrashort laser pulses with a medium can generate trains of attosecond pulses. Here, ultrafast photonic streaking launches successive individual attosecond pulses in different directions, enabling direct experimental access to these pulses, which carry information on the ultrafast dynamics of the medium.Article p651IMAGE: KIM ET AL.COVER DESIGN: TOM WILSON
The quest for on-chip optical isolators has recently spawned many new isolator structures. However, there has been some confusion about the requirement of nonreciprocity. Here, we review the essential characteristics of an isolator.
Caging pairs of propagating solitons in a fibre ring resonator allows scientists to observe the solitons travelling astronomical distances, revealing the effects of extremely tiny forces exerted by the leading soliton on the trailing one.
Cavity-enhanced high-harmonic generation has been extended to the ∼10 nm wavelength range by using a pierced cavity mirror for outcoupling. This light source has the potential to realize further advances in precision extreme-ultraviolet spectroscopy and attosecond physics.
Further sensitivity improvements are required before advanced optical interferometers will be able to measure gravitational waves. A team has now shown that introducing quantum squeezing of light may help to detect these elusive waves.
Two independent groups have concurrently reported the first bosonic lasers driven by electrical injection. Although the devices operate only at low temperatures and in a strong magnetic field, they represent an important step forward in the evolution of polariton-based optoelectronics.
By using propagation in a nonlinear medium, several spatial modes and photons can be simultaneously interacted spatially. This enables the conventional laws of imaging, which are based on linear propagation theory, to be bent.
New themes such as quantum effects and nonlocality presented at the Sixth International Conference on Surface Plasmon Photonics along with new work in traditional fields indicate that plasmonics is not slowing down yet.
This article reviews recent progress in the use of silicon nitride and Hydex as non-silicon-based CMOS-compatible platforms for nonlinear optics. New capabilities such as on-chip optical frequency comb generation, ultrafast optical pulse generation and measurement using these materials, and their potential future impact and challenges are covered.
Spatially coherent 11.45 nm radiation is produced by outcoupling the harmonics of cavity-enhanced nonlinearly compressed pulses from a Yb-based laser through a pierced cavity mirror. This technique may lead to high-photon-flux ultrashort-pulse extreme-ultraviolet sources for use in a wide range of applications.
Squeezed states of light have been experimentally demonstrated to improve the performance of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) in astrophysically relevant frequency regions. This enhanced performance may help to reach the sensitivity required for detecting gravitational waves.
An ultrafast terahertz (THz) scanning tunnelling microscope (STM) with subpicosecond time resolution and nanometre spatial resolution has been developed. THz pulses are coupled to the metal tip of a commercial STM and THz-pulse-induced tunnelling is observed in the STM. The THz-STM can directly image ultrafast carrier capture by a single InAs nanodot.
Researchers demonstrate a laser interferometer that achieves simultaneous nonclassical readout of two conjugated observables. Because their system uses steady-state entanglement, it does not require any conditioning or post-selection. By distinguishing between scientific and parasitic signals, its sensitivity exceeds the standard quantum limit by about 6 dB.
A highly efficient method is demonstrated for detecting individual photons scattering from short-lived transitions in single trapped ions. An entangled state is used to amplify the tiny momentum kick an ion receives on scattering a photon. Cat-state spectroscopy has an 18-fold higher measurement sensitivity than the direct detection method.
An organic field effect transistor featuring the chiral molecule helicene acts as a photodetector that is able to distinguish between left- and right-handed circularly polarized light.
Nonlinear optics can overcome the diffraction limit through the presence and interaction of many photons. Abbe's diffraction theory is now generalized to include spatial nonlinearity, and wave mixing is treated as a self-induced structured illumination, thereby allowing a standard imaging system to be nonlinearly enhanced beyond its conventional limits.
By employing monocrystalline semiconductor materials as high-quality optical coatings, the long-standing challenge of minimizing the optical phase noise produced by Brownian motion in a multilayer has been overcome. A thermally limited noise floor consistent with a tenfold reduction in mechanical damping relative to that in the best dielectric multilayers is achieved.
An all-optical photonic streaking measurement is demonstrated that provides direct experimental access to individual attosecond pulses. The effects of non-adiabatic electron dynamics and plasma formation on the generated attosecond pulse train are directly observed when the pulse train is applied to harmonic generation in gases.
Recirculating temporal optical cavity solitons in a coherently driven passive optical fibre ring resonator allows pairs of solitons to interact over distances 8,000 times their width. This finding highlights the extreme stability, robustness and coherence of the process, and of solitons in general.
Stéphane Coen and Miro Erkintalo from the University of Auckland in New Zealand talk to Nature Photonics about their surprising findings regarding a weak long-range interaction they serendipitously stumbled upon while researching temporal cavity solitons.