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  • RESEARCH HIGHLIGHT

‘Bow ties’ break record for bottling up light

Similar designs could store information in circuits that carry light instead of electrical current.
Tiny silicon bowtie structure claims record photon confinement in time and space.

A newly designed photonic crystal traps light using a series of bow-tie-shaped gaps. Photon density (depicted in 3D for easy visualization) is highest at the centre of the bow tie’s knot (red) and dwindles (from yellow to green to purple) towards the knot’s outer edges. Credit: Ella Maru Studio

Light can be trapped with unprecedented effectiveness inside a device smaller than a dust particle.

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Nature 561, 8 (2018)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-06141-6

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