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There is typically a compromise between speed and efficiency when designing silicon photodiodes. Now, researchers have exploited microstructuring to achieve fast and thin devices that are also efficient.
A laser-annealing technique for increasing the dopant concentration in semiconductors, the creation of a glass with second-order optical nonlinearity and the realization of optical topological insulators were highlights at the Japan Society of Applied Physics Spring Meeting.
Combining attosecond science and nanophotonics potentially offers a route to enhance control over light–matter interactions at the nanoscale and provide a promising platform for information processing.
It has been revealed that simple anisotropic optical waveguides and the vectorial nature of electromagnetic waves can support a variety of bound states in the continuum akin to those introduced in quantum mechanics almost a century ago.
The emission direction and timing of extreme-ultraviolet light can now be manipulated through an opto-optical approach that uses an infrared pulse to control the spatial and spectral phase of free induction decay resulting from atoms excited by attosecond light.
Reabsorption losses have long been holding back the commercial viability of luminescent solar concentrators. Now, non-toxic silicon-based quantum dots with enhanced Stokes shift may enable the technology to enjoy practical implementation.
Coherent backscattering experiments indicate that spontaneous Raman scattering is a coherent process that can lead to macroscopically observable interference phenomena in disordered solid-state samples.
The mathematics of manifolds is providing inspiration for creating exotic states of light with unique properties such as robustness against disorder and unidirectional propagation.
Measurement of the forces that arise from quantum vacuum fluctuations between closely spaced surfaces typically requires large apparatus, making applications difficult. Now, an experiment on a silicon chip to measure the Casimir force has been realized.
Weak coupling of light to the microscopic magnetic order in antiferromagnetic materials makes their optical characterization notoriously difficult. Now, a table-top magneto-optical technique has been developed for detecting the vector direction of antiparallel-aligned magnetic moments in a metallic antiferromagnet.
