Featured
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News |
Global observatory sees first light
Expanding network of telescopes will give a seamless view of the changing sky.
- Eric Hand
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Research Highlights |
Camera sees hidden objects
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Outlook |
Come into the light
Transparency across the spectrum combined with electronic prowess makes graphene an ideal photonic material.
- Neil Savage
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News |
Superconducting detectors offer high-speed astronomy
Microwave kinetic inductance detectors could help find gravitational waves and extrasolar planets.
- Eric Hand
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News |
Gemini’s twin telescopes reboot
Adaptive optics put the observatory at the cutting edge.
- Eric Hand
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Letter |
Microwave amplification with nanomechanical resonators
Use of nanomechanical resonators has the potential to offer microwave amplification with the minimum possible added noise, namely that due to quantum fluctuations.
- F. Massel
- , T. T. Heikkilä
- & M. A. Sillanpää
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News |
The seven suns of Rome
A diagram lost for more than 350 years documents a spectacular sky of 1630.
- Kate McAlpine
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Article |
Diffraction-unlimited all-optical imaging and writing with a photochromic GFP
- Tim Grotjohann
- , Ilaria Testa
- & Stefan W. Hell
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News |
Virtual hunt for solar technology yields initial results
Theoretical screening method produces first sample molecule as researchers analyse 3.5 million candidates for solar cells.
- Jeff Tollefson
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News & Views |
Microwave ion-trap quantum computing
A new type of ion-trap quantum technology has been developed that uses microwave radiation to perform computations. It will considerably simplify the practical implementation of large-scale quantum computers. See Letters p.181 & p.185
- Winfried K. Hensinger
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Letter |
Quantum gates and memory using microwave-dressed states
- N. Timoney
- , I. Baumgart
- & Ch. Wunderlich
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News |
No turning back for light
'Optical diode' could help make commercial photonic chips a reality.
- Zeeya Merali
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News & Views |
Bound and unbound planets abound
Two teams searching for extrasolar planets have jointly discovered a new population of objects: ten Jupiter-mass planets far from their host stars, or perhaps even floating freely through the Milky Way. See Letter p.349
- Joachim Wambsganss
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Research Highlights |
Light switch at the speed of light
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Letter |
Electromagnetically induced transparency and slow light with optomechanics
In atomic systems, electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) has been the subject of much experimental research, as it enables light to be slowed and stopped. This study demonstrates EIT and tunable optical delays in a nanoscale optomechanical device, fabricated by simply etching holes into a thin film of silicon. These results indicate significant progress towards an integrated quantum optomechanical memory, and are also relevant to classical signal processing applications: at room temperature, the system can be used for optical buffering, amplification and filtering of microwave-over-optical signals.
- A. H. Safavi-Naeini
- , T. P. Mayer Alegre
- & O. Painter
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News |
Connect the quantum dots for a full-colour image
Nanocrystal display could be used in high-resolution, low-energy televisions.
- Zeeya Merali
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News |
Brazil ignites telescope race
Deal boosts Europe's bid to build world's biggest observatory, as US groups compete for funds.
- Adam Mann
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Research Highlights |
Optics: Taking wing on a beam of light
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Research Highlights |
Optics: Through a glass darkly
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News & Views |
Suckers for light
An optical device has been designed that performs a function exactly opposite to that of a laser. It perfectly absorbs incoming coherent radiation and turns it into thermal or electrical energy.
- Claire F. Gmachl
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Books & Arts |
Last days of the lone astronomer
A celebratory account of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey highlights astronomy's culture shift to big science — but at what risk to individual ingenuity, asks Joss Bland-Hawthorn?
- Joss Bland-Hawthorn
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Letter |
A ground-layer adaptive optics system with multiple laser guide stars
Ground-based telescopes can in principle make high-resolution, wide-field observations when fitted with ground-layer adaptive optics (GLAO). These authors report observations of the core of the globular cluster M3 after a recent upgrade to their GLAO system. In natural seeing of 0.7″, the point spread function at 2.2-µm wavelength was sharpened to 0.3″ over a field of at least 2′. The wide-field resolution was enhanced by a factor of two to three over previous work, and extends to a wavelength of 1.2 ′m.
- M. Hart
- , N. M. Milton
- & E. Bendek
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News Feature |
Astronomy: Ready for boarding — finally
NASA and Germany have spent 15 years and billions of dollars on SOFIA, an airborne telescope that is about to produce its first results. Eric Hand asks whether the science will justify the cost.
- Eric Hand
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Research Highlights |
Astronomy: Clouds with an H2 lining
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Research Highlights |
Optical devices: Organic light
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Correspondence |
Earthquake defence and the price of a telescope
- Leopoldo Infante
- & Juan Carlos de la Llera
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News & Views |
Optoelectronic chaos
Optoelectronic circuits with delayed feedback provide a convenient bench-top platform to study a wide range of nonlinear dynamic systems, from ultrastable clocks to complex chaotic devices.
- Laurent Larger
- & John M. Dudley
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News |
Telescope arrays give fine view of stars
Optical interferometry is no longer on the fringe of astronomy.
- Eric Hand
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Research Highlights |
Photonics: Carbon light catcher
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News |
Galileo backed Copernicus despite data
Stars viewed through early telescopes suggested that Earth stood still.
- Katharine Sanderson
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Letter |
Reinventing germanium avalanche photodetector for nanophotonic on-chip optical interconnects
To integrate microchips with optical communications a photodetector is required to mediate the optical and electronic signals. Although germanium photodetectors are compatible with silicon their performance is impaired by poor intrinsic noise. Here the noise is reduced by nanometre engineering of optical and electrical fields to produce a compact and efficient photodetector.
- Solomon Assefa
- , Fengnian Xia
- & Yurii A. Vlasov
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News |
Underwater robot automates ocean testing
'Lab in a can' eliminates the middleman between sample site and lab.
- Richard A. Lovett
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Research Highlights |
Geophysics: Synthetic sky light
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News Feature |
Smart grids: The energy storage problem
Renewable energy is not a viable option unless energy can be stored on a large scale. David Lindley looks at five ways to do that.
- David Lindley
Infant galaxy offers tantalizing peek at early Universe
A graphene-based broadband optical modulator
Physicists reverse the laser
Silicon whiskers catch rays wellBrowse broader subjects
Browse narrower subjects
- Adaptive optics
- Astronomical optics
- Atmospheric optics
- Displays
- Fibre optics and optical communications
- Integrated optics
- Laser material processing
- Microwave photonics
- Mid-infrared photonics
- Optical data storage
- Optical sensors
- Optoelectronic devices and components
- Solar energy and photovoltaic technology
