Recent advances of wide-angle metalenses: principle, design, and applications
Optical imaging systems, like microscopes, cameras, and telescopes, continue to expand the scope of human observation of the world. As one of the key indicators of imaging systems, the field-of-view (FOV) is often limited by coma aberration. Expanding it …
Conditions for establishing the “generalized Snell’s law of refraction” in all-dielectric metasurfaces: theoretical bases for design of high-efficiency beam deflection metasurfaces
The generalized Snell’s law dictates that introducing a phase gradient at the interface of two media can shape incident light and achieve anomalous reflection or refraction. However, when the introduced phase gradient is realized via the scattering of …
Highly ordered arrays of hat-shaped hierarchical nanostructures with different curvatures for sensitive SERS and plasmon-driven catalysis
Regulation of hot spots exhibits excellent potential in many applications including nanolasers, energy harvesting, sensing, and subwavelength imaging. Here, hat-shaped hierarchical nanostructures with different space curvatures have been proposed to enhance …
Extended bound states in the continuum in a one-dimensional grating implemented on a distributed Bragg reflector
Bound states in the continuum (BICs) are observed in optical cavities composed of a high refractive index periodic structure embedded in significantly lower refractive index surroundings, enabling vertical confinement of the grating modes. Here, we propose a …
Improved localization precision via restricting confined biomolecule stochastic motion in single-molecule localization microscopy
Single-molecule localization microscopy (SMLM) plays an irreplaceable role in biological studies, in which nanometer-sized biomolecules are hardly to be resolved due to diffraction limit unless being stochastically activated and accurately located by SMLM. …
Vector optomechanical entanglement
The polarizations of optical fields, besides field intensities, provide more degrees of freedom to manipulate coherent light–matter interactions. Here, we propose how to achieve a coherent switch of optomechanical entanglement in a polarized-light-driven …
Negative optical force field on supercavitating titanium nitride nanoparticles by a single plane wave
A pulling motion of supercavitating plasmonic nanoparticle (NP) by a single plane wave has received attention for the fundamental physics and potential applications in various fields (e.g., bio-applications, nanofabrication, and nanorobotics). Here, the …
Local nonlinearity engineering of evanescent-field-interaction fiber devices embedding in black phosphorus quantum dots
Tapered fiber (TF) and D-shaped fiber (DF) are two types of widely investigated devices in facilitating evanescent-field interactions with external materials. Although they have been found to be particularly useful in various ultrafast regimes, to date there …
Terahertz toroidal metasurface biosensor for sensitive distinction of lung cancer cells
Lung cancer is the most frequently life-threatening disease and the prominent cause of cancer-related mortality among human beings worldwide, where poor early diagnosis and expensive detection costs are considered as significant reasons. Here, we try to …
Imaging-based optical barcoding for relative humidity sensing based on meta-tip
In a wide range of applications such as healthcare treatment, environmental monitoring, food processing and storage, and semiconductor chip manufacturing, relative humidity (RH) sensing is required. However, traditional fiber-optic humidity sensors face the …
Two-dimensional array of iron-garnet nanocylinders supporting localized and lattice modes for the broadband boosted magneto-optics
We demonstrate a novel all-dielectric magnetophotonic structure that consists of two-dimensional arrays of bismuth substituted iron-garnet nanocylinders supporting both localized (Fabry–Perot-like) and lattice (guided-like) optical modes. Simultaneous …
Generation and dynamics of soliton and soliton molecules from a VSe2/GO-based fiber laser
Recently, in addition to exploring the application of new saturable absorber devices in fiber lasers, soliton dynamics has also become a focus of current research. In this article, we report an ultrashort pulse fiber laser based on VSe2/GO nanocomposite and …
Band structure tuning of g-C3N4 via sulfur doping for broadband near-infrared ultrafast photonic applications
Graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) featuring a stable heptazine ring structure and high polymerization degree, was indexed as a high thermochemical stability material, attracting rising research enthusiasm for diverse applications. However, the poor …
Observing multifarious topological phase transitions with real-space indicator
First- and second-order topological phases, capable of inherent protection against disorder of materials, have been recently experimentally demonstrated in various artificial materials through observing the topologically protected edge states. Topological …
Crossing the light line
We ask the question “what happens to Bloch waves in gratings synthetically moving at near the speed of light?”. First we define a constant refractive index (CRI) model in which Bloch waves remain well defined as they break the light barrier, then show …