Search results for "photonics"

Two optical devices could reduce the need to take tissue samples during medical examinations and operations and to then send them for testing – potentially speeding up diagnosis and treatment and cutting healthcare costs. One is a lightweight handheld microscope designed to examine external tissue or tissue exposed during surgery. One example of its use could be to help surgeons compare normal and cancerous cells (during an operation).

Yale scientists have found a way to greatly boost the intensity of light waves on a silicon microchip using the power of sound. Writing in the journal Nature Photonics, a team led by Peter Rakich describes a new waveguide system that harnesses the ability to precisely control the interaction of light and sound waves. This work solves a long-standing problem of how to utilise this interaction in a robust manner on a silicon chip as the basis for p...

Terahertz spectroscopy, which uses the band of electromagnetic radiation between microwaves and infrared light, is a promising security technology because it can extract the spectroscopic "fingerprints" of a wide range of materials, including chemicals used in explosives. But traditional terahertz spectroscopy requires a radiation source that's heavy and about the size of a large suitcase, and it takes 15 to 30 minutes to analyse a single sample,...

Terahertz radiation - the band of electromagnetic radiation between microwaves and visible light - has promising applications in security and medical diagnostics, but such devices will require the development of compact, low-power, high-quality terahertz lasers.

By immersing glass particles in a fluid, researchers at MIT’s Media Lab and Harvard University are exploring a new mechanism for modifying an optical device’s diffusivity, or the extent to which it scatters light. In its current form, the new diffuser could be used to calibrate a wide range of imaging systems, but the researchers believe that their mechanism could ultimately lead to holographic video screens or to tunable optical devi...

Researchers from the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China have developed a method that could open up scientific avenues by making the light from powerful X-ray lasers much more stable and its colour more pure.The idea behind the technique is to "seed" X-ray lasers with regular lasers, whose light already has these qualities.

Leiden physicists describe a method to measure so-called surface plasmons, which could lead to the latest light-based technologies, including faster internet. When audiences watch a new Game of Thrones episode, they usually don't think about the billions of flashes of light that race through a worldwide optical fiber network each second, resulting in images on the screen. Those flashes of light encounter numerous nodes, among them, the router ins...

To help address megatrends in industrial internet applications, Inkron, a specialist in printed nano-composite siloxane-based electronic packaging materials for the optoelectronics, printed electronics and display industries, has announced the availability of turnkey optoelectronic service solutions.

Imagine a device that is selectively transparent to various wavelengths of light at one moment, and opaque to them the next, following a minute adjustment. Such a gatekeeper would enable powerful and unique capabilities in a wide range of electronic, optical and other applications, including those that rely on transistors or other components that switch on and off.

Uppsala physicists have in an international collaboration developed a method for creating laser pulses which are shorter, have much higher intensity and cover the THzfrequency range better than current sources. The study is published today in the authoritative journalNature Photonicsand is of great importance to materials research.“Many interesting, dynamic phenomena of interest to materials science occur within the so-called terahertz spec...