Related papers: Comment on "How many principles does it take to ch…
In his Comment, Els\"asser claims that the answer to my titular question is one, not four as I have it. He goes on to give the singular principle that supposedly captures the difference between a light-bulb and a laser: $g^{(2)}(\tau=0)=1$.…
Quantum optics did not, and could not, flourish without the laser. The present paper is not about the principles of laser construction, still less a history of how the laser was invented. Rather, it addresses the question: what are the…
We show that a laser beam can be diffracted by a more concentrated light pulse due to quantum vacuum effects. We compute analytically the intensity pattern in a realistic experimental configuration, and discuss how it can be used to measure…
Scattering relativistic electrons with optical lasers can result in a significant frequency upshift for the photons, potentially producing $\gamma$-rays. This is what linear Compton scattering taught us. Ultra-intense lasers offer nowadays…
We show that if the laser is intense enough, it may always ionize an atom or induce transitions between discrete energy levels of the atom, no matter what is its frequency. It means in the quantum transition of an atom interacting with an…
A mere correspondence between the electron statistics and the photon one vanishes in the feedback loop (FBL). It means that the direct photodetection, supplying us with the electron statistics, does not provide us with a wished information…
This paper describes the first experimental demonstration of the guiding of a relativistic electron beam in a solid target using two co-linear, relativistically intense, picosecond laser pulses. The first pulse creates a magnetic field…
An ultrarelativistic electron beam passing through an intense laser pulse emits radiation around its direction of propagation into a characteristic angular profile. Here we show that measurement of the variances of this profile in the…
Collisions between high intensity laser pulses and energetic electron beams are now used to measure the transition between the classical and quantum regimes of light-matter interactions. However, the energy spectrum of…
We consider the creation of polarization entangled light from parametric down- conversion driven by an intense pulsed pump inside a cavity. The multi-photon states produced are close approximations to singlet states of two very large spins.…
The most commonly observed quantity related to light is its power or equivalently its energy. It can be either measured with a bolometer, a photodiode or estimated with the naked eye. Alternatively people can measure the light impulse or…
We show that the reduction in photon number fluctuations at laser threshold often cited as a fundamental laser property does not occur in typical semiconductor lasers such as the ones commonly used in modern technological applications…
Lasers essentially consist of single-mode optical cavities containing two-level atoms with a supply of energy called the pump and a sink of energy, perhaps an optical detector. The latter converts the light energy into a sequence of…
Deciphering the conditions under which neutron captures occur in the Universe to synthesize heavy elements is an endeavour pursued since the 1950s, but that has proven elusive up to now due to the experimental difficulty of generating the…
Branched flow can be observed when a laser beam is coupled into a soap film. This research theoretically explored the phenomenon through analogy between light wave and particles in form of Hamilton-Jacobian equation, further discussed the…
Light, being massless, casts no shadow; under ordinary circumstances, photons pass right through each other unimpeded. Here, we demonstrate a laser beam acting like an object - the beam casts a shadow upon a surface when the beam is…
The versatility of optics enables the design of a wide range of elegant beam instrumentation. Multiple properties of particle beams can be precisely measured by various optical techniques, which include: direct sampling of optical radiation…
We review studies of the fluctuations of light made accessible by the invention of the laser and the strong interactions realized in cavity QED experiments. Photon antibunching advocating the discrete (particles), is contrasted with…
This paper gives a personal global point of view on two sciences: electronics and photonics towards plasmonics and solar energy conversion. The new research directions in these two sciences are pointed out by comparison and in the…
We present a simple thought experiment in which a beam of light of a finite length (a light-pulse) enters a detection device that consists of a wave detector and a light bulb. We examine the experiment from the reference frame where the…