Optics News

December 5, 2023

Top Headlines

Chemists Create Organic Molecules in a Rainbow of Colors

Dec. 5, 2023 — Chemists have now come up with a way to make molecules known as acenes more stable, allowing them to synthesize acenes of varying lengths. Using their new approach, they were able to build molecules that emit red, orange, yellow, green, or blue ...

Laser Additive Manufacturing: Listening for Defects as They Happen

Dec. 5, 2023 — Researchers have resolved a long-standing debate surrounding laser additive manufacturing processes with a pioneering approach to defect ...

Optical Data Storage Breakthrough

Dec. 4, 2023 — Physicists have developed a technique with the potential to enhance optical data storage capacity in diamonds. This is possible by multiplexing the storage in the spectral ...

Tiny Electromagnets Made of Ultra-Thin Carbon

Dec. 4, 2023 — Graphene, that is extremely thin carbon, is considered a true miracle material. An international research team has now added another facet to its diverse properties with new experiments: Experts fired short terahertz pulses at micrometer-sized discs ...

Latest Headlines

updated 11:06pm EST

'Doughnut' Beams Help Physicists See Incredibly Small Objects

Dec. 4, 2023 — A new laser-based technique can create images of structures too tiny to view with traditional microscopes, and without damaging them. The approach could help scientists inspect nanoelectronics, ...

A Color-Based Sensor to Emulate Skin's Sensitivity

Dec. 1, 2023 — In a step toward more autonomous soft robots and wearable technologies, researchers have created a device that uses color to simultaneously sense multiple mechanical and temperature ...

To Help Autonomous Vehicles Make Moral Decisions, Researchers Ditch the 'Trolley Problem'

Dec. 1, 2023 — Researchers have developed a new experiment to better understand what people view as moral and immoral decisions related to driving vehicles, with ...

What Was Thought of as Noise, Points to New Type of Ultrafast Magnetic Switching

Nov. 29, 2023 — Researchers discover a new type of ultrafast magnetic switching by investigating fluctuations that normally tend to interfere with experiments as ...

Eye-Safe Laser Technology to Diagnose Traumatic Brain Injury

Nov. 29, 2023 — Researchers have designed and developed a novel diagnostic device to detect traumatic brain injury (TBI) by shining a safe laser into the ...

Compact Accelerator Technology Achieves Major Energy Milestone

Nov. 27, 2023 — Researchers have demonstrated a compact particle accelerator less than 20 meters long that produces an electron beam with an energy of 10 billion electron volts (10 GeV). There are only two other ...

The Secret Life of an Electromagnon

Nov. 28, 2023 — Scientists have revealed how lattice vibrations and spins talk to each other in a hybrid excitation known as an electromagnon. To achieve this, they used a unique combination of experiments on an ...

Nextgen Computing: Hard-to-Move Quasiparticles Glide Up Pyramid Edges

Nov. 28, 2023 — A new kind of 'wire' for moving excitons could help enable a new class of devices, perhaps including room temperature quantum ...

AI for Perovskite Solar Cells: Key to Better Manufacturing

Nov. 22, 2023 — Tandem solar cells based on perovskite semiconductors convert sunlight to electricity more efficiently than conventional silicon solar cells. In order to make this technology ready for the market, ...

Long in the Bluetooth: Scientists Develop a More Efficient Way to Transmit Data Between Our Devices

Nov. 21, 2023 — Researchers have developed a more energy efficient way of connecting our personal devices. New technology consumes less power than Bluetooth and can ...

Earlier Headlines

Summaries
Headlines

Breakthrough in Photoactivatable Nanomedicine for the Treatment of Age-Related Macular Degeneration

Dec. 5, 2023 — Researchers have developed a light-activatable prodrug nanomedicine for age-related macular degeneration (AMD) therapy. Through the intravenous injection of the nanomedicine and application of light ...

A Farsighted Approach to Tackle Nearsightedness

Dec. 5, 2023 — As humans age, our eyes adjust based on how we use them, growing or shortening to focus where needed, and we now know that blurred input to the eye while the eye is growing causes myopia. It is so ...

A Deep-Sea Fish Inspired Researchers to Develop Supramolecular Light-Driven Machinery

Nov. 17, 2023 — Chemists have developed a bioinspired supramolecular approach to convert photo-switchable molecules from their stable state into metastable one with low-energy red light. Their work enables fast, ...

Novel Measurement Technique for Fluid Mixing Phenomena Using Selective Color Imaging Method

Nov. 17, 2023 — A novel measurement technique has been developed to visualize the fluid flow and distribution within two droplets levitated and coalesced in space using fluorescence-emitting particles. This ...

New Laser Setup Probes Metamaterial Structures With Ultrafast Pulses

Nov. 15, 2023 — A new technique offers a safe, reliable, and high-throughput way to dynamically characterize microscale metamaterials. The method could speed up the development of acoustic lenses, impact-resistant ...

Tracking Down Quantum Flickering of the Vacuum

Nov. 13, 2023 — Absolutely empty -- that is how most of us envision the vacuum. Yet, in reality, it is filled with an energetic flickering: the quantum fluctuations. Experts are currently preparing a laser ...

Photo-Induced Superconductivity on a Chip

Nov. 13, 2023 — Researchers have shown that a previously demonstrated ability to turn on superconductivity with a laser beam can be integrated on a chip, opening up a route toward opto-electronic ...

Solar-Powered Device Produces Clean Water and Clean Fuel at the Same Time

Nov. 13, 2023 — A floating, solar-powered device that can turn contaminated water or seawater into clean hydrogen fuel and purified water, anywhere in the world, has been developed by ...

Quantum Mechanics: Unlocking the Secrets of Spin With High-Harmonic Probes

Nov. 10, 2023 — Deep within every piece of magnetic material, electrons dance to the invisible tune of quantum mechanics. Their spins, akin to tiny atomic tops, dictate the magnetic behavior of the material they ...

Atomic Dance Gives Rise to a Magnet

Nov. 9, 2023 — Researchers turned a paramagnetic material into a magnet by manipulating electrons' spin via atomic ...

Photonics Team Develops High-Performance Ultrafast Lasers That Fit on a Fingertip

Nov. 9, 2023 — Scientists demonstrate a novel approach for creating high-performance ultrafast lasers on nanophotonic chips. The new advance will enable pocket-sized devices that can perform detailed GPS-free ...

Chemists Image Basic Blocks of Synthetic Polymers

Nov. 9, 2023 — Researchers have developed a new method to image polymerization catalysis reactions one monomer at a ...

'Indoor Solar' to Power the Internet of Things

Nov. 9, 2023 — From Wi-Fi-connected home security systems to smart toilets, the so-called Internet of Things brings personalization and convenience to devices that help run homes. But with that comes tangled ...

'Hot' New Form of Microscopy Examines Materials Using Evanescent Waves

Nov. 7, 2023 — A team of researchers has built a prototype microscope that does not rely on backscattered radiation, instead uses passive detection of thermally excited evanescent waves. They have examined ...

Decarbonizing Light-Duty Transportation in the United States: Study Reveals Strategies to Achieve Goal

Nov. 6, 2023 — Researchers found that meeting greenhouse gas emissions goals for light-duty vehicles, which are passenger vehicles such as cars and trucks, is possible, but not just by increasing electric vehicle ...

Vacuum in Optical Cavity Can Change Material's Magnetic State Without Laser Excitation

Nov. 3, 2023 — Researchers in Germany and the USA have produced the first theoretical demonstration that the magnetic state of an atomically thin material, ?-RuCl3, can be controlled solely by placing it into an ...

Optical-Fiber Based Single-Photon Light Source at Room Temperature for Next-Generation Quantum Processing

Nov. 2, 2023 — Single-photon emitters quantum mechanically connect quantum bits (or qubits) between nodes in quantum networks. They are typically made by embedding rare-earth elements in optical fibers at extremely ...

Bartering Light for Light: Scientists Discover New System to Control the Chaotic Behavior of Light

Nov. 2, 2023 — Researchers describe a new platform for controlling the chaotic behavior of light by tailoring its scattering patterns using light ...

In a Surprising Finding, Light Can Make Water Evaporate Without Heat

Nov. 1, 2023 — At the interface of water and air, light can, in certain conditions, bring about evaporation without the need for heat, according to a new ...

New Twist on Optical Tweezers

Nov. 1, 2023 — Optical tweezers use laser light to manipulate small particles. A new method has been advanced using Stampede2 supercomputer simulations that makes optical tweezers safer to use for potential ...

Tuesday, December 5, 2023

Friday, November 17, 2023

Wednesday, November 15, 2023