Contents
2020
Volume: 1 Issue 4
13 Article(s)

Export citation format
PEROVSKITE PHOTONICS
Phase segregation in inorganic mixed-halide perovskites: from phenomena to mechanisms
Yutao Wang, Xavier Quintana, Jiyun Kim, Xinwei Guan, Long Hu, Chun-Ho Lin, Brendon Tyler Jones, Weijian Chen, Xiaoming Wen, Hanwei Gao, and Tom Wu

Halide perovskites, such as methylammonium lead halide perovskites (MAPbX3, X=I, Br, and Cl), are emerging as promising candidates for a wide range of optoelectronic applications, including solar cells, light-emitting diodes, and photodetectors, due to their superior optoelectronic properties. All-inorganic lead halide perovskites CsPbX3 are attracting a lot of attention because replacing the organic cations with Cs+ enhances the stability, and its halide-mixing derivatives offer broad bandgap tunability covering nearly the entire visible spectrum. However, there is evidence suggesting that the optical properties of mixed-halide perovskites are influenced by phase segregation under external stimuli, especially illumination, which may negatively impact the performance of optoelectronic devices. It is reported that the mixed-halide perovskites in forms of thin films and nanocrystals are segregated into a low-bandgap I-rich phase and a high-bandgap Br-rich phase. Herein, we present a critical review on the synthesis and basic properties of all-inorganic perovskites, phase-segregation phenomena, plausible mechanisms, and methods to mitigate phase segregation, providing insights on advancing mixed-halide perovskite optoelectronics with reliable performance.

Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Oct. 30, 2020
  • Vol. 8 Issue 11 11000A56 (2020)
Cavity engineering of two-dimensional perovskites and inherent light-matter interaction | On the Cover
Shuai Zhang, Yangguang Zhong, Fan Yang, Qinxuan Cao, Wenna Du, Jianwei Shi, and Xinfeng Liu

Two-dimensional (2D) perovskites are hybrid layered materials in which the inorganic lattice of an octahedron is sandwiched by organic layers. They behave as a quantum-well structure exhibiting large exciton binding energy and high emission efficiency, which is excellent for photonic applications. Hence, the cavity modulation and cavity devices of 2D perovskites are widely investigated. In this review, we summarize the rich photophysics, synthetic methods of different cavity structures, and the cavity-based applications of 2D perovskites. We highlight the strong exciton–photon coupling and photonic lasing obtained in different cavity structures. In addition, functional optoelectronic devices using cavity structures of 2D perovskites are also reviewed.

Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Oct. 30, 2020
  • Vol. 8 Issue 11 11000A72 (2020)
TOPOLOGICAL PHOTONICS and BEYOND
Manipulating light radiation from a topological perspective
Xuefan Yin, and Chao Peng

Manipulating radiation is important for a variety of optoelectronic applications, such as on-chip lasers, energy-efficient grating couplers, and antennas for light detection and ranging. Although designing and optimizing those optoelectronic devices are usually believed to be an engineering-oriented task, recent research reveals that the principles underlying radiation manipulation are closely connected to the concept of topology—the study of properties that are invariant under continuous deformations. In this review, we summarize a series of advances of the physics, phenomena, and applications related to radiation manipulation, in which topological concepts were adopted. Radiation could carry energy escaping from the system, breaking the energy conservation. The non-Hermiticity of such systems brings quite different physical consequences when comparing with the Hermitian counterparts and, hence, also results in the emergence of many interesting and extraordinary phenomena. In particular, it is found that the perfect trapping of light can still be realized in such non-Hermitian systems because of the photonic realization of bound states in the continuum. The fundamental nature of bound states in the continuum has been identified to be topological: they are essentially topological defects of the polarization vector field in momentum space, depicted by a kind of topological invariant named topological charges. Therefore, manipulation of radiation channels can be realized by controlling the topological charge evolution in momentum space. It is also demonstrated that the photonic states accompanied with different topological charges generate vortex beams with unique far-field radiation patterns, and ultra-fast switching of such vortex beams is demonstrated according to this principle. The progresses of topological photonics upon light radiation show that the topology is not just mathematical convenience for depicting photonic systems, but has brought realistic consequences in manipulating light and will boost the applications of photonics and optoelectronics in many aspects.

Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Oct. 21, 2020
  • Vol. 8 Issue 11 11000B25 (2020)
Diffraction and Gratings
Chirped pulse amplification: review and prospective from diffractive optics [Invited]
Changhe Zhou
It is well-known that the chirped pulse amplification (CPA) technique won the award for the 2018 Nobel Prize in Physics to Mourou and Strickland. The compression and stretching using gratings is the essence of the CPA technique for amplifying femtosecond laser pulses. It seems the public is less aware that there are also other structures for compression and stretching of femtosecond laser pulses using other diffractive gratings, such as doubled-density gratings and deep-etched gratings. Therefore, from the view of diffractive optics, the CPA technique is reviewed with different approaches and experimental implementations that are not only useful for a more comprehensive retrospective overview of CPA, but also for the prospective of the CPA technique, which might lead us to new areas of picometer and femtometer optics in the future.
Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Nov. 10, 2020
  • Vol. 18 Issue 11 110502 (2020)
Fiber Optics and Optical Communications
Micro- and nano-fiber probes for optical sensing, imaging, and stimulation in biomedical applications
Xia Yu, Shuyan Zhang, Malini Olivo, and Nanxi Li
The flexibile nature of optical fiber enables it to offer remote-access capabilities, which could be used in many biomedical applications. This review focuses on different micro- and nano-structured fiber probes for applications in biosensing, imaging, and stimulations. The modifications to fiber could extend design freedom from waveguide optimization to functional material integration. Fiber probes with optimized waveguide structures or integrated functional materials could achieve enhanced optical mode interaction with biosamples, and hence obtain ultrasensitive biosensors with a remarkably low limit of detection. Furthermore, bioimaging with a high spatial resolution can be obtained by engineering dispersion and nonlinearity of light propagation in the fiber core or designing a metal-coated tapered fiber tip with a sub-wavelength aperture. Flat metasurfaces can be assembled on a fiber tip to achieve a large depth of focus and remove aberrations. Fiber is also a compact solution to realize the precise delivery of light for in vivo applications, such as deep brain stimulation. The optical beam size, shape, and direction could be steered by the probe parameters. Micro- and nano-technologies integrated with fiber contribute to various approaches to further improve detection limit, sensitivity, optical resolution, imaging depth, and stimulation precision.
Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Oct. 22, 2020
  • Vol. 8 Issue 11 11001703 (2020)
Instrumentation and Measurements
Emerging micro-additive manufacturing technologies enabled by novel optical methods
Wei Lin, Dihan Chen, and Shih-Chi Chen

This paper presents a comprehensive review of recent advances in micro-additive manufacturing enabled by novel optical methods with an emphasis on photopolymerization-based printing processes. Additive manufacturing, also known as three-dimensional (3D) printing, has become an important engineering solution to construct customized components or functional devices at low cost. As a green manufacturing technology, 3D printing has the advantages of high energy efficiency, low material consumption, and high precision. The rapid advancement of 3D printing technology has broadened its applications from laboratory research to industrial manufacturing. Generally, 3D objects to be printed are constructed digitally [e.g., via computer-aided design (CAD) programs] by connecting a 3D dot array, where a dot is defined as a voxel through mechanical, electrical, or optical means. The voxel size ranges from a few orders of magnitude of the wavelength of light to the sub-diffraction limit, achieved by material nonlinearity and precise power thresholding. In recent years, extensive research in optical additive manufacturing has led to various breakthroughs in quality, rate, and reproducibility. In this paper, we review various micro-3D printing techniques, including single-photon and two-photon processes, with a focus on innovative optical methods, e.g., ultrafast beam shaping, digital holography, and temporal focusing. We also review and compare recent technological advances in serial and parallel scanning systems from the perspectives of resolution, rate, and repeatability, where the strengths and weaknesses of different methods are discussed for both fundamental and industrial applications.

Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Nov. 12, 2020
  • Vol. 8 Issue 12 12001827 (2020)
Integrated Optics
Advances in on-chip photonic devices based on lithium niobate on insulator | Editors' Pick
Jintian Lin, Fang Bo, Ya Cheng, and Jingjun Xu
Crystalline lithium niobate (LN) is an important optical material because of its broad transmission window that spans from ultraviolet to mid-infrared and its large nonlinear and electro-optic coefficients. Furthermore, the recent development and commercialization of LN-on-insulator (LNOI) technology has opened an avenue for the realization of integrated on-chip photonic devices with unprecedented performances in terms of propagation loss, optical nonlinearity, and electro-optic tunability. This review begins with a brief introduction of the history and current status of LNOI photonics. We then discuss the fabrication techniques of LNOI-based photonic structures and devices. The recent revolution in the LN photonic industry has been sparked and is still being powered by innovations of the nanofabrication technology of LNOI, which enables the production of building block structures, such as optical microresonators and waveguides of unprecedented optical qualities. The following sections present various on-chip LNOI devices categorized into nonlinear photonic and electro-optic tunable devices and photonic-integrated circuits. Some conclusions and future perspectives are provided.
Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Nov. 30, 2020
  • Vol. 8 Issue 12 12001910 (2020)
Reviews
Optical studies of semiconductor perovskite nanocrystals for classical optoelectronic applications and quantum information technologies: a review
Zengle Cao, Fengrui Hu, Chunfeng Zhang, Shining Zhu, Min Xiao, and Xiaoyong Wang
Semiconductor perovskite films are now being widely investigated as light harvesters in solar cells with ever-increasing power conversion efficiencies, which have motivated the fabrication of other optoelectronic devices, such as light-emitting diodes, lasers, and photodetectors. Their superior material and optical properties are shared by the counterpart colloidal nanocrystals (NCs), with the additional advantage of quantum confinement that can yield size-dependent optical emission ranging from the near-UV to near-infrared wavelengths. So far, intensive research efforts have been devoted to the optical characterization of perovskite NC ensembles, revealing not only fundamental exciton relaxation and recombination dynamics but also low-threshold amplified spontaneous emission and novel superfluorescence effects. Meanwhile, the application of single-particle spectroscopy techniques to perovskite NCs has helped to resolve a variety of optical properties for which there are few equivalents in traditional colloidal NCs, mainly including nonblinking photoluminescence, suppressed spectral diffusion, stable exciton fine structures, and coherent single-photon emission. While the main purpose of ensemble optical studies is to guide the smooth development of perovskite NCs in classical optoelectronic applications, the rich observations from single-particle optical studies mark the emergence of a potential platform that can be exploited for quantum information technologies.
Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Sep. 21, 2020
  • Vol. 2 Issue 5 054001 (2020)
Brief history of spaser from conception to the future
Mark I. Stockman
A history and a glimpse into the future of spaser (acronym for “surface plasmon amplification by stimulated emission of radiation”) is provided. The spaser (also called a plasmonic nanolaser) is an active nanosystem including a gain medium and a nanoplasmonic metal core. It generates coherent intense nanolocalized fields. Theoretically predicted in 2003 by Bergman and Stockman, the spaser grew into a large fundamental research and application field with thousands of publications. We review a few of them to illustrate the most important and general fundamental properties of the spaser. We also review some selected applications of spasers, in particular, to ultrasensing and biomedical problems, concentrating on cancer-cell theranostics (therapeutics and diagnostics). In conclusion, we attempt to glimpse into the future by predicting that the next big development of the spasers will be topological nano-optics, and its “killer” application will be ultrafast, high-density on-chip communications for future information processing.
Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Oct. 30, 2020
  • Vol. 2 Issue 5 054002 (2020)
Multifunctional integration on optical fiber tips: challenges and opportunities
Yifeng Xiong, and Fei Xu
The flat endface of an optical fiber tip is an emerging light-coupled microscopic platform that combines fiber optics with planar micro- and nanotechnologies. Since different materials and structures are integrated onto the endfaces, optical fiber tip devices have miniature sizes, diverse integrated functions, and low insertion losses, making them suitable for all-optical networks. In recent decades, the increasing demand for multifunctional optical fibers has created opportunities to develop various structures on fiber tips. Meanwhile, the unconventional shape of optical fibers presents challenges involving the adaptation of standard planar micro- and nanostructure preparation strategies for fiber tips. In this context, researchers are committed to exploring and optimizing fiber tip manufacturing techniques, thereby paving the way for future integrated all-fiber devices with multifunctional applications. First, we present a broad overview of current fabrication technologies, classified as “top-down,” “bottom-up,” and “material transfer” methods, for patterning optical fiber tips. Next, we review typical structures integrated on fiber tips and their known and potential applications, categorized with respect to functional structure configurations, including “optical functionalization” and “electrical integration.” Finally, we discuss the prospects for future opportunities involving multifunctional integrated fiber tips.
Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Nov. 04, 2020
  • Vol. 2 Issue 6 064001 (2020)
Quantum entanglement on photonic chips: a review
Xiaojiong Chen, Zhaorong Fu, Qihuang Gong, and Jianwei Wang
Review of Optics: a virtual journal
  • Publication Date: Dec. 07, 2021
  • Vol. 3 Issue 6 064002 (2021)

About the Cover

Review of Optics: a virtual journal, started in 2019, is a virtual review journal, and it contains high-quality review articles from journals that published by Chinese Laser Press independently or along with its partners. Review of Optics is published quarterly. It aims to provide readers an alternative way to quickly look through high quality review papers. The scope of Review of Optics covers the full area of optics and photonics and relevant interdisciplinary topics, and meanwhile is in accordance with its source journals: Advanced Photonics, Chinese Optics Letters, High Power Laser Science and engineering and Photonics Research.