Volume 9 Issue 10, October 2015

The use of photonics technology is bringing new capabilities and insights to cardiovascular medicine. Intracoronary imaging and sensing, laser ablation and optical pacing are just some of the functions being explored to help diagnose and treat conditions of the heart and arteries.

Nanodiamonds that are levitated by light and are equipped with internal spin provide a new platform for performing quantum and optomechanical experiments with massive, environmentally isolated objects.

Perovskite semiconductors have altered the landscape of solar cell research. Now researchers show that these materials may also offer a flexible platform for colour imaging and wavelength-selective sensing.

The opportunities and challenges for wide-scale deployment of silicon photonics in data centres dominated discussion at this year's Group IV Photonics conference in Canada.

Hyperbolic phonon polaritons confined to the subdiffraction limit exhibit encouragingly long lifetimes and group velocities as slow as 0.002c. Researchers use a time-resolved set-up sensitive to nanometre-scale optical fields to shed light on the exciting optical properties of hyperbolic materials.

This review covers state-of-the-art quantum teleportation technologies, from photonic qubits and optical modes to atomic ensembles, trapped atoms and solid-state systems. Open issues and potential future implementations are also discussed.

A hybrid nano-optomechanical system — a nanodiamond levitated in an optical dipole trap that contains a single nitrogen vacancy centre — shows the ability to simultaneously control multidimensional optical, phononic and spin degrees of freedom.

Based on optical saturation of the excited state of single fluorescent molecules with a doughnut-shaped beam, sub-10-nm-resolution optical microscopy at cryogenic temperatures is achieved.

Researchers use Anderson localization in nanotextured amorphous silicon and demonstrate enhanced absorption of light.

Structured light is used to created optical traps with stiffness an order of magnitude higher than conventional Gaussian traps in one-dimension.

Time-domain interferometry and near-field scanning microscopy are used to investigate infrared phonon polaritons exhibiting hyperbolic dispersion. Negative phase velocity and group velocity as small as 0.002c are confirmed.

Perovskite-based devices typically exhibit broadband spectral responses. Here narrowband (< 20 nm FWHM) response is achieved for a photodetector application.

Photodiodes with an intrinsic narrow spectral response make it possible to discriminate between red, green and blue light without the need for any optical filters.

The morphology of perovskites, a materials system of great interest for use in solar cells and other optoelectronic devices, is found to strongly modify their charge generation and transport properties.