Reviews & Analysis

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  • A sub-cycle modulation in reflectivity is observed in bulk crystals subjected to intense laser fields. The effect provides a new way to probe attosecond dynamics in materials.

    • Shambhu Ghimire
    News & Views
  • Plasmonic lasers display many unique features, but these were so far unrelated to magnetism. Recent research shows that plasmonic lasers can be switched on and off magnetically.

    • Peter M. Oppeneer
    • Vassilios Kapaklis
    News & Views
  • The introduction of piezo-optomechanical phase shifters into silicon optical chips enables the realization of complex, controllable optical processing circuits with negligible static power dissipation, high-speed configuration and compatibility with wafer-scale fabrication.

    • David A. B. Miller
    News & Views
  • Giorgio Parisi recently shared a Nobel Prize in Physics for his contribution to the theory of complex systems. What is not well known is that photonics was crucial to validating Parisi’s predictions.

    • Claudio Conti
    • Eugenio DelRe
    News & Views
  • Measurement of the arrival times of annihilation photons in a detector with greater precision is opening the way to new direct forms of tomographic positron emission imaging that do not require back-projection-based reconstruction techniques.

    • Suleman Surti
    • Joel S. Karp
    News & Views
  • For 20 years, nanoscale 3D printing has been based on two-photon absorption, requiring expensive pulsed lasers. Now, via a two-step absorption process, such printing has been demonstrated using a low-cost, low-power continuous-wave laser diode, showing the potential for dramatic cost reductions in 3D nanoprinting.

    • Paul V. Braun
    • Mark L. Brongersma
    News & Views
  • Progress on Landau level lasers—based on external magnetic field splitting of electronic states—is reviewed, with particular attention paid to the potential for tunable terahertz lasers.

    • Erich Gornik
    • Gottfried Strasser
    • Karl Unterrainer
    Review Article
  • The three-dimensional images generated by digital holography are usually limited to a single color. A new technique exploiting frequency combs generates holograms with hundreds of colors at once.

    • Chao Dong
    • David Burghoff
    News & Views
  • The direct generation of femtosecond pulses from an 8-μm quantum cascade laser could prove transformative for sensing and spectroscopy.

    • Sukhdeep Dhillon
    News & Views
  • The demonstration of a germanium-based photodiode with a 3 dB bandwidth of 265 GHz and compatibility with silicon photonics and CMOS fabrication offers a cost-effective route to faster channel data rates for optical communications.

    • Léopold Virot
    News & Views
  • The stabilization of perovskite nanocrystals (PeNCs) by a surrounding metal–organic framework (MOF) results in a simple yet effective way to make extraordinarily bright PeNC-based LEDs, with stable continuous operation of up to tens of hours.

    • Hilmi Volkan Demir
    News & Views
  • Quantum teleportation is demonstrated between light and the vibrations of a nanomechanical resonator, realizing a key capability for quantum computing.

    • Glen I. Harris
    • Warwick P. Bowen
    News & Views
  • This Review summarizes the latest state-of-the-art technologies for high-speed multiphoton (fluorescence) microscopy, especially at kilohertz 2D frame rate, and 3D video rate or beyond—a speed regime that was generally inconceivable until very recently, as well as the prospects and challenges of these emerging technologies.

    • Jianglai Wu
    • Na Ji
    • Kevin K. Tsia
    Review Article
  • Practical on-chip optical isolators providing non-reciprocal propagation are still a challenge. Now, two independent groups show that a phonon-mediated break of the chiral symmetry in waveguide resonators may offer a solution.

    • Sakellaris Mailis
    News & Views