Volume 11 Issue 11, November 2017

The creation of a global quantum network is now a realistic proposition thanks to developments in satellite and fibre links and quantum memory. Applications will range from secure communication and fundamental physics experiments to a future quantum internet.

Giorgio Anania, the vice president of Photonics21 and CEO of Aledia, a French developer of GaN microwire LEDs, discusses the impact of the Photonics Public Private Partnership on jobs and growth in Europe and the importance of investing in future industries.

The demonstration of strong coupling between two nuclear polariton modes in the X-ray spectral region using two coupled cavities each containing a thin layer of iron brings new opportunities for exploring quantum science.

Diffraction-free light-sheet beams, strongly confined in one axis, are typically thought to self-bend during propagation in free space and cannot be made flat. Now, diffraction-free planar light sheets in air have been realized by exploiting polychromatic pulsed beams.

Optical trapping of ions is relatively new and has been limited to a few milliseconds so far. Now researchers have trapped a single barium ion for several seconds, putting experiments with ultracold atoms and ions within reach.

At the 24th General Congress of the International Commission for Optics in Tokyo, photonics-based sensing and simulations were shown to benefit research into phenomena that span the nanometre to astronomical range.

A nested purification protocol is developed by combining entanglement purification and swapping. It works for the spontaneous parametric downconversion sources as well as other physical systems that suffer from double-pair emission noise.

Unconditional entanglement-enhanced photonic interferometry is implemented by using a state-of-the-art photon source and detectors. Sampling a birefringent phase shift, precision beyond the shot-noise limit is demonstrated without data correction.

Optical trapping of ions with a high level of isolation from the environment is achieved, opening a path to performing ultracold interactions of ions and atoms at previously inaccessible collision energies.

The Pohang Accelerator Laboratory X-ray Free Electron Laser (PAL-XFEL) in South Korea has now entered operation with a timing jitter of just 20 fs.

An optical-based scheme for ultrasound sensing provides very high sensitivity with excellent broadband acoustic frequency response and wide directivity.

Rabi oscillations in the regime of hard X-rays are observed between two ensembles of the nuclear resonant isotope ⁵⁷Fe. The sample system consists of two thin-film cavities stacked on top of each other, coupled through a thin interlayer.

Double perovskite Cs₂AgBiBr₆ single crystals are used to make a sensitive X-ray detector. The device exhibits a high sensitivity of 105 µC Gy_air ⁻¹ cm⁻² and a low detection limit of 59.7 nGy_airs⁻¹, and demonstrates long-term operational stability.

One-dimensional non-diffracting sheets of light are achieved without exploiting nonlinearity. Such light sheets may be exploited in microscopy and sensing applications.