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It is theoretically shown that nanometric silver lamellar gratings present very strong visible light absorption inside the grooves, leading to electric field intensities by several orders of magnitude larger than that of the impinging…
Slow-light enhanced optical detection in liquid-infiltrated photonic crystals is theoretically studied. Using a scattering-matrix approach and the Wigner-Smith delay time concept, we show that optical absorbance benefits both from…
This work experimentally studies silicon-cored tungsten nanowire selective metamaterial absorber to enhance solar-thermal energy harvesting, simply fabricated by conformally coating a thin tungsten layer onto a commercial silicon nanowire…
The positive effects of various perturbations introduced in a bidimensional photonic-crystal patterned membrane on its integrated absorption are investigated numerically and theoretically. Two phenomena responsible for the enhanced…
We study the impact of optical field-enhancement effects on the optoelectronic properties of metal nanoparticle arrays. Applying a focused ion beam lithography in combination with an electron beam deposition technique we can pattern…
We present state-of-the-art first-principle calculations of the electronic and optical properties of silicon allotropes with interesting characteristics for applications in thin-film solar cells. These new phases consist of distorted sp$^3$…
We report on design and fabrication of nano-composite metal-dielectric thin film coatings with high reflectance asymmetries. Applying basic dispersion engineering principles to model a broadband and large reflectance asymmetry, we obtain a…
We measured the optical absorptance of superconducting nanowire single photon detectors. We found that 200-nm-pitch, 50%-fill-factor devices had an average absorptance of 21% for normally-incident front-illumination of 1.55-um-wavelength…
We have shown that alloying a noble metal (gold) with another metal (cadmium), which can contribute two electrons per atom to a free electron gas, can significantly improve the metals optical properties in certain wavelength ranges and make…
ZnO/GaN alloys exhibit exceptional photocatalyst applications owing to the flexibly tunable band gaps that cover a wide range of the solar spectrum, and thus have attracted extensive attentions over the past few years. In this study,…
Plasmonic materials and metamaterials have been widely utilized to achieve spectral transmission, reflection and absorption filters based on localized or delocalized resonances arising from the interaction of photons with nanostructured…
Applications such as augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR), optical atomic clocks, and quantum computing require photonic integration of (near-)visible laser sources to enable commercialization at scale. The heterogeneous integration of…
We show that thin dielectric films can be used to enhance the performance of passive atomic mirrors by enabling quantum reflection probabilities of over 90% for atoms incident at velocities ~1 mm/s, achieved in recent experiments. This…
Optical properties of metallic nanoparticles are most often considered in terms of plasmons, the coupled states of light and quasi-free electrons. Here we predict that confinement of electrons inside the nanostructure leads to another, very…
We propose an efficient multiband absorber comprising a truncated one-dimensional periodic metal-dielectric photonic crystal and a reflective substrate. The reflective substrate is actually an optically thick metallic film. Such a planar…
Metasurface based super absorbers exhibit near unity absorbance. While the absorption peak can be tuned by the geometry/size of the sub-wavelength resonator, broadband absorption can be obtained by placing multiple resonators of various…
The improvement of light absorption in Si/BeSe$_{0.41}$Te$_{0.59}$ heterostructures for solar cell applications is studied theoretically. First, using simple approaches we found that light absorption could be improved in a single…
A broadband, thermally stable absorber is essential for thermophotovoltaic (TPV) systems to simultaneously convert solar and industrial waste heat into usable energy to meet growing power demands. Here, we proposed an ingenious…
Optical interference is used to enhance light-matter interaction and harvest broadband light in ultrathin semiconductor absorber films on specular back-reflectors. However, the high-temperature processing in oxygen atmosphere required for…
A central challenge in quantum technologies based on atom-like defects is the efficient collection of the emitter's fluorescence. Optical antennas are appealing as they offer directional emission together with spontaneous emission rate…