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This story is from the category Sensors
Date posted: 11/07/2013 There are several ways to “trap” a beam of light — usually with mirrors, other reflective surfaces, or high-tech materials such as photonic crystals. But now researchers at MIT have discovered a new method to trap light that could find a wide variety of applications. The new system, devised through computer modeling and then demonstrated experimentally, pits light waves against light waves: It sets up two waves that have the same wavelength, but exactly opposite phases — where one wave has a peak, the other has a trough — so that the waves cancel each other out. Meanwhile, light of other wavelengths (or colors) can pass through freely. The researchers say that this phenomenon could apply to any type of wave: sound waves, radio waves, electrons (whose behavior can be described by wave equations), and even waves in water. The discovery is reported this week in the journal Nature by professors of physics Marin Soljačić and John Joannopoulos, associate professor of applied mathematics Steven Johnson, and graduate students Chia Wei Hsu, Bo Zhen, Jeongwon Lee and Song-Liang Chua. “For many optical devices you want to build,” Soljačić says — including lasers, solar cells and fiber optics — “you need a way to confine light.” This has most often been accomplished using mirrors of various kinds, including both traditional mirrors and more advanced dielectric mirrors, as well as exotic photonic crystals and devices that rely on a phenomenon called Anderson localization. In all of these cases, light’s passage is blocked: In physics terminology, there are no “permitted” states for the light to continue on its path, so it is forced into a reflection. In the new system, however, that is not the case. Instead, light of a particular wavelength is blocked by destructive interference from other waves that are precisely out of phase. “It’s a very different way of confining light,” Soljačić says. While there may ultimately be practical applications, at this point the team is focused on its discovery of a new, unexpected phenomenon. “New physical phenomena often enable new applications,” Hsu says. Possible applications, he suggests, could include large-area lasers and chemical or biological sensors. See the full Story via external site: web.mit.edu Most recent stories in this category (Sensors): 28/02/2017: DJI drones use plane avoidance tech |
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