optoelectronics

If tiny nanowire semiconductors could actually convert electricity into light and back again at the right wavelengths, their potential to speed up computers, make solar cells more efficient, and make LEDs more colorful would be achievable.…

Levitation may sound like the stuff of magic shows or New Age gurus, but California Institute of Technology researchers have designed a way to levitate and propel objects using only light, by creating specific nanoscale patterning on the…

Spectrally pure lasers are a core component of precision high-end scientific and commercial applications due to their ability to produce near-perfect single-color light. A laser's capacity to do so is measured in terms of its linewidth, or…

The absorption of light in semiconductor crystals without inversion symmetry can generate electric currents. Researchers at the Max-Born-Institute have now generated directed currents at terahertz (THz) frequencies, much higher than the…