Related papers: Full-span reversible space-time birefringence
Ultrafast optical control of ferroelectricity based on short and intense light can be utilized to achieve accurate manipulations of ferroelectric materials, which may pave a basis for future breakthrough in nonvolatile memories. Here, we…
Samples of Ag$^+$/Na$^{+}$ ion-exchanged glass that have been subject to intense laser irradiation may develop novel optical properties, as a consequence of the formation of patterns of silver nanoparticles and other structures. Here, we…
In view of momentum continuity at a temporal slab, it is shown that instantaneous switching of an isotropic medium to an anisotropic medium offers the incident frequency a directional property- a counterintuitive process which is called…
Large optical anisotropy observed in a broad spectral range is of paramount importance for efficient light manipulation in countless devices. Although a giant anisotropy was recently observed in the mid-infrared wavelength range, for…
We demonstrate that anisotropy of Fresnel diffraction in a birefringent medium can be quantitatively characterized by a planar tensor. Eigenvectors of the tensor correspond to directions of minimum and maximum beam divergence. Zero…
Optical birefringence is a fundamental optical property of crystals widely used for filtering and beam splitting of photons. Birefringent crystals concurrently possess the property of linear dichroism (LD) that allows asymmetric propagation…
We report on the observation and measurement of the transfer of transverse angular momentum to birefringent particles several wavelengths in size. A trapped birefringent particle is much larger than the nano-particles systems for which…
Cosmological Birefringence (CB) is a phenomenon, caused by parity violating modifications to electrodynamics, whereby the linear polarisation angle of light changes as photons traverse a vacuum. It is possible to use a number of different…
Control of the phase and polarization states of light is an important goal for nearly all optical research. The development of an efficient optical component that allows the simultaneous manipulation of the polarization and phase…
The control of light through all-optical means is a fundamental challenge in nanophotonics and a key effect in optical switching and logic. The optical bistability effect enables this control and can be observed in various planar photonic…
Tapered optical fibers (TOFs) with sub-wavelength-diameter waists, known as optical nanofibers, are powerful tools for interfacing quantum emitters and nanophotonics. These applications demand stable polarization of the fiber-guided light…
Adding spin-polarized carriers to semiconductor lasers strongly changes their properties and, through the transfer of angular momentum, leads to the emission of circularly polarized light. In such spin-lasers, the polarization of the…
Liquid crystals allow for the real-time control of the polarization of light. We describe and provide some experimental examples of the types of general polarization transformations, including universal polarization transformations, that…
The integration of nanoscale electronics with conventional optical devices is restricted by the diffraction limit of light. Metals can confine light at the subwavelength scales needed, but they are lossy, while dielectric materials do not…
Semiconductor spin lasers are distinguished from their conventional counterparts by the presence of spin-polarized carriers. The transfer of angular momentum of the spin-polarized carriers to photons provides important opportunities for the…
High-index dielectrics can confine light into nano-scale leading to enhanced nonlinear response. However, increased momentum in these media can deteriorate the overlap between different harmonics which hinders efficient nonlinear…
We show that the polarization state of coherent light propagating through an optically thick multiple-scattering medium, can be controlled by wavefront shaping, i.e. by controlling only the spatial phase of the incoming field with a spatial…
The ability to control solid-state quantum emitters is fundamental to advancing quantum technologies. The performance of these systems is fundamentally governed by their spin-dependent photodynamics, yet conventional control methods using…
We investigate the inherent influence of light polarization on the intensity distribution in anisotropic media undergoing a local inhomogeneous rotation of the principal axes. Whereas in general such configuration implies a complicated…
We report experimental observation and theoretical explanation of novel propagation regimes for optical beams in an artificial nonlinear material with outstanding photorefractive properties. Nondiffractive beams, which keep their shapes…