Applied optics articles within Nature

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  • Letter |

    Contrary to current expectation, eavesdropping on terahertz wireless data links is shown to be easier than expected, by placing an object in the path of the signal that scatters part of it to a receiver located elsewhere.

    • Jianjun Ma
    • , Rabi Shrestha
    •  & Daniel M. Mittleman

  • Letter |

    An optical-frequency synthesizer based on stabilized frequency combs has been developed utilizing chip-scale devices as key components, in a move towards using integrated photonics technology for ultrafast science and metrology.

    • Daryl T. Spencer
    • , Tara Drake
    •  & Scott B. Papp

  • Letter |

    Ohmic losses in plasmonic devices can be reduced by exploiting ‘resonant switching’, in which light couples to surface plasmon polaritons only when in resonance and bypasses them otherwise.

    • Christian Haffner
    • , Daniel Chelladurai
    •  & Juerg Leuthold

  • Letter |

    Photophoretic optical trapping of cellulose particles and persistence of vision are used to produce real-space volumetric images that can be viewed from all angles, in geometries unachievable by holograms and light-field technologies.

    • D. E. Smalley
    • , E. Nygaard
    •  & J. Peatross

  • Letter |

    Ablation cooling is demonstrated as an effective means of removing material using successive bursts of laser pulses with short intraburst delay times; the technique allows the overall pulse energy to be decreased, overcoming negative thermal effects during the ablation process.

    • Can Kerse
    • , Hamit Kalaycıoğlu
    •  & Fatih Ömer Ilday

  • Letter |

    An electronic–photonic microprocessor chip manufactured using a conventional microelectronics foundry process is demonstrated; the chip contains 70 million transistors and 850 photonic components and directly uses light to communicate to other chips.

    • Chen Sun
    • , Mark T. Wade
    •  & Vladimir M. Stojanović

  • Letter |

    Inorganic–organic lead halide perovskite could be efficient when used as the light-harvesting component of solar cells; here incorporation of methylammonium lead bromide into formamidinium lead iodide stabilizes the perovskite and improves the power conversion efficiency of the solar cell up to 17.9 per cent.

    • Nam Joong Jeon
    • , Jun Hong Noh
    •  & Sang Il Seok

  • Letter |

    The next generation of radar systems must be photonic to obtain frequency flexibility and improved performance; here both generation and detection of radio signals are demonstrated in a successful field trial of a photonic-based radar system using aeroplanes.

    • Paolo Ghelfi
    • , Francesco Laghezza
    •  & Antonella Bogoni

  • Letter |

    The resonant interaction between γ-ray photons and an ensemble of nuclei with a periodically modulated resonant transition frequency can be used to control the waveforms of the photons coherently; for example, individual γ-ray photons can be converted into a coherent, ultrashort pulse train or into a double pulse.

    • Farit Vagizov
    • , Vladimir Antonov
    •  & Olga Kocharovskaya

  • Letter |

    Most known ferroelectric photovoltaic materials have very wide electronic bandgaps (that is, they absorb only high-energy photons) but here a family of perovskite oxides is described that have tunable bandgaps, allowing their use across the whole visible-light spectrum.

    • Ilya Grinberg
    • , D. Vincent West
    •  & Andrew M. Rappe

  • Outlook |

    Are biofuels the way forward, or should we be looking to advanced solar technologies to power the future? The debate began on Lindau and continues here.

  • Letter |

    The use of organometal halide perovskites as the light-absorbing material in nanostructured solar cells has increased efficiency to practical levels; here it is shown that vapour deposition of the perovskite removes the need for complex nanostructures and will hence simplify large-scale manufacture.

    • Mingzhen Liu
    • , Michael B. Johnston
    •  & Henry J. Snaith

  • Letter |

    An experimental demonstration of the concept of a ‘quantum access network’ based on simple and cost-effective telecommunication technologies yields a viable method for realizing multi-user quantum key distribution networks with efficient use of resources.

    • Bernd Fröhlich
    • , James F. Dynes
    •  & Andrew J. Shields

  • Letter |

    A method of producing perovskite-sensitized solar cells by sequential — as opposed to single-step — deposition of the perovskite’s components onto a nanoporous titanium oxide film allows for greater reproducibility of device performance and a record power conversion efficiency of 15 per cent.

    • Julian Burschka
    • , Norman Pellet
    •  & Michael Grätzel

  • Article |

    Realizing holographic video displays is proving far from straightforward, but it is shown here that it may be possible to overcome the limitations of present displays by harnessing the desirable optical manipulation properties of anisotropic leaky-mode spatial light modulators.

    • D. E. Smalley
    • , Q. Y. J. Smithwick
    •  & S. Jolly

  • Letter |

    The ‘time cloak’ experiment is extended here using a time analogue of the Talbot effect in optics — in which a plane wave incident on a diffraction grating produces repeated images of the grating at regular distances — to show that almost half of the time axis can be concealed.

    • Joseph M. Lukens
    • , Daniel E. Leaird
    •  & Andrew M. Weiner

  • Letter |

    A broadband, compact, all-electrically driven mid-infrared frequency comb based on a quantum cascade laser widens the scope of application of combs in this frequency range beyond that of sources which depend on a chain of optical components.

    • Andreas Hugi
    • , Gustavo Villares
    •  & Jérôme Faist

  • Q&A |

    Optical physicist plans to use 'genius grant' to promote search for exoplanets.

    • Virginia Gewin

  • Letter |

    Two gold nanostructures with controllable subnanometre separation are used to follow the evolution of plasmonic modes; the distance at which quantum tunnelling sets in is determined, and a quantum limit for plasmonic field confinement is estimated.

    • Kevin J. Savage
    • , Matthew M. Hawkeye
    •  & Jeremy J. Baumberg

  • News & Views |

    Carbon nanotubes interact strongly with light — a property that makes them ideal components of holographic devices. The realization of such a device opens up fresh opportunities for holography.

    • Stéphane Larouche
    •  & David R. Smith

  • News & Views |

    The technological potential of masers — the microwave equivalents of lasers — has been thwarted by their impractical operating conditions. A solid-state maser that works at room temperature may change that. See Letter p.353

    • Aharon Blank

  • News |

    A camera that can take billion-pixel images may be available to researchers - and consumers - in the coming years.

    • Katherine Bourzac

  • News |

    Compact device promises to open window on chemical reactions in the lab.

    • Katherine Bourzac

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