Gaptronics: multilevel photonics applications spanning zero-nanometer limits
With recent advances in nanofabrication technology, various metallic gap structures with gap widths reaching a few to sub-nanometer, and even ‘zero-nanometer’, have been realized. At such regime, metallic gaps not only exhibit strong electromagnetic field …
Ultrafast photonics applications of emerging 2D-Xenes beyond graphene
Driven by new two-dimensional materials, great changes and progress have taken place in the field of ultrafast photonics in recent years. Among them, the emerging single element two-dimensional materials (Xenes) have also received much attention due to their …
Nonlocal effects in temporal metamaterials
Nonlocality is a fundamental concept in photonics. For instance, nonlocal wave-matter interactions in spatially modulated metamaterials enable novel effects, such as giant electromagnetic chirality, artificial magnetism, and negative refraction. Here, we …
Pattern-tunable synthetic gauge fields in topological photonic graphene
We propose a straightforward and effective approach to design, by pattern-tunable strain-engineering, photonic topological insulators supporting high quality factors edge states. Chiral strain-engineering creates opposite synthetic gauge fields in two domains …
Generalized temporal transfer matrix method: a systematic approach to solving electromagnetic wave scattering in temporally stratified structures
Opening a new door to tailoring electromagnetic (EM) waves, temporal boundaries have attracted the attention of researchers in recent years, which have led to many intriguing applications. However, the current theoretical approaches are far from enough to …
Femtosecond imaging of spatial deformation of surface plasmon polariton wave packet during resonant interaction with nanocavity
The spatiotemporal dynamics of a surface plasmon polariton (SPP) wave packet (WP) that interacts with a plasmonic nanocavity on a metal surface are investigated via femtosecond time-resolved two-photon fluorescence microscopy and numerical calculations. The …
Probing the long-lived photo-generated charge carriers in transition metal dichalcogenides by time-resolved microwave photoconductivity
Understanding the dissociation of excitons into long-lived free charge carriers is a crucial issue when considering the applications of transition metal dichalcogenides (excitonic semiconductors) oriented toward the use of solar energy (such as photovoltaics …
Second-order topological phases in C_4v-symmetric photonic crystals beyond the two-dimensional Su-Schrieffer–Heeger model
Second-order photonic topological insulators (SPTIs) with topologically protected corner states provide a unique platform for realizing the robust manipulation of light in lower dimensions. Previous SPTIs proposed in C 4v -symmetric lattices are mainly …
Full-visible-spectrum perovskite quantum dots by anion exchange resin assisted synthesis
Photoelectric properties of all-inorganic perovskite quantum dots (IPQDs) highly depend on their synthetic route. However, current synthetic processes of IPQDs are widely facing potential unsustainable issues of containing nonreusable and high-cost auxiliary …
Multidimensional engineered metasurface for ultrafast terahertz switching at frequency-agile channels
The ability to actively manipulate free-space optical signals by using tunable metasurfaces is extremely appealing for many device applications. However, integrating photoactive semiconductors into terahertz metamaterials still suffers from a limited …
High efficiency and large optical anisotropy in the high-order nonlinear processes of 2D perovskite nanosheets
Nonlinear nanophotonic devices have brought about great advances in the fields of nano-optics, quantum science, biomedical engineering, etc. However, in order to push these nanophotonic devices out of laboratory, it is still highly necessary to improve their …
Dynamic millimeter-wave OAM beam generation through programmable metasurface
Millimeter-wave (mmWave) and orbital angular momentum (OAM) multiplexing are two key technologies for modern wireless communications, where significant efforts have been devoted to combining these two technologies for extremely high channel capacities. …
Intelligent metasurface with frequency recognition for adaptive manipulation of electromagnetic wave
Due to the strong ability of recognizing electromagnetic (EM) environment and adaptively control of EM waves, the intelligent metasurfaces have received great attention recently. However, the intelligent metasurface with frequency recognition for adaptive …
Singularities splitting phenomenon for the superposition of hybrid orders structured lights and the corresponding interference discrimination method
It is the basic characteristic of pure vortex light that there is a phase singularity at the origin. Such a singularity may be multiple degenerate, which determines the order of vortex light. Singularities splitting phenomenon means that singularities no …
Inverse-designed waveguide-based biosensor for high-sensitivity, single-frequency detection of biomolecules
Integrated silicon photonic waveguide biosensors have shown great potential for detecting bio-molecules because they enable efficient device functionalization via a well-developed surface chemistry, as well as simple scalable manufacturing, which makes them …