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Applied physics

Optical sensing gets exceptional

Nature volume 548, pages 161–162 (2017)Cite this article

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Conventional sensors based on devices called optical resonators have fundamentally limited sensitivity. Careful engineering has been used to overcome this constraint, opening the door to ultraprecise sensing. See Letters p.187 & p.192

Light-confining structures called optical resonators make ideal sensors for a range of phenomena, including mechanical vibrations and changes in temperature, as well as for nanoparticles and biomolecules such as viruses and DNA1. However, the performance of conventional sensors based on optical resonators is fundamentally limited — halving the strength of the perturbation being sensed halves the ability of the device to sense it. On pages 187 and 192, respectively, Hodaei et al.2 and Chen et al.3 demonstrate a mechanism that avoids this limitation, paving the way for sensors that have unprecedented sensitivity to tiny changes in their environments.

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Figure 1: Improving the sensitivity of optical-resonator sensors.

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References

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  1. the Department of Physics, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 16802, Pennsylvania, USA

    Mikael C. Rechtsman

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  1. Mikael C. Rechtsman
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Correspondence to Mikael C. Rechtsman.

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Rechtsman, M. Optical sensing gets exceptional. Nature 548, 161–162 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/548161a

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