Related papers: Standing-Wave Optical Trap Based on Retro-Reflecti…
Optical trapping has proven to be a valuable experimental technique for precisely controlling small dielectric objects. However, due to their very nature, conventional optical traps are diffraction limited and require high intensities to…
We propose and experimentally demonstrate a novel optical method for trapping and cooling dielectric nanospheres at (sub)-micron distances from a reflective metallic surface. By translating a tilted mirror towards the focus of a single-beam…
The physical origin of subwavelength photonic nanojet in retrograde-reflection mode (retro-PNJ) is theoretically considered. This specific type of photonic nanojet emerges upon sequential double focusing of a plane optical wave by a…
Photonic nanojets have been brought into attention ten years ago for potential application in ultramicroscopy, because of its sub-wavelength resolution that can enhance detection and interaction with matter. For these novel applications…
The possibility of overcoming the critical condition for localized photonic nanojet upon plane optical wave diffraction at mesoscale dielectric particle, which is commonly known as "the refractive index contrast is less than two", was…
Over the past few decades, optical manipulation has emerged as a highly successful tool in various fields, such as biology, micro/nanorobotics, and physics. Among the different techniques, the transverse slot optical waveguide has shown…
We report on a novel Magneto-Optical Trap (MOT) geometry involving the retroreflection of one of the six MOT beams in order to create an atom cloud close to the surface of a prism which does not have optical access along one axis. A MOT of…
Optical dipole-traps are used in various scientific fields, including classical optics, quantum optics and biophysics. Here, we propose and implement a dipole-trap for nanoparticles that is based on focusing from the full solid angle with a…
Optically-levitated nanoparticles in vacuum offer a pristine platform for high-quality mechanical oscillators, enabling a wide range of precision measurements and quantum technologies. A key performance metric in such systems is the…
Plasmonic nanostructures can overcome Abbe's diffraction limit to generate strong gradient fields, enabling efficient optical trapping of nano-sized particles. However, it remains challenging to achieve stable trapping with low incident…
Optical trapping is an indispensable tool in physics and the life sciences. However, there is a clear trade off between the size of a particle to be trapped, its spatial confinement, and the intensities required. This is due to the decrease…
We propose a method of trapping atoms in arrays near to the surface of a composite nanophotonic device with optimal coupling to a single cavity mode. The device, comprised of a nanofiber mounted on a grating, allows the formation of…
We show theoretically that the noise due to laser induced backaction acting on a small nanosphere levitated in a standing-wave trap can be considerably reduced by utilising a suitable reflective boundary. We examine the spherical mirror…
Controlled trapping of light absorbing nanoparticles with low-power optical tweezers is crucial for remote manipulation of small objects. This study takes advantage of the synergetic effects of tightly confined local fields of plasmonic…
This communication describes the observation of a new type of dark spontaneous-force optical trap (dark SPOT) obtained without the use of a mask blocking the central part of the repumper laser beam. We observe that loading a magneto-optical…
We present a novel approach to determine the optical properties of materials in the nanoscale range using optical tweezers (OT). Fluorescent polymer-based nanostructures (pdots) are optically trapped in a Gaussian beam OT and the trap…
Achieving quantum-limited motional control of optically trapped particles beyond the sub-micrometer scale is an outstanding problem in levitated optomechanics. A key obstacle is solving the light scattering problem and identifying particle…
The center-of-mass motion of optically trapped dielectric nanoparticles in vacuum is extremely well-decoupled from its environment, making a powerful tool for measurements of feeble sub-attonewton forces. We demonstrate a method to trap and…
Super-oscillating beams can be used to create light spots whose size is below the diffraction limit with a side ring of high intensity adjacent to them. Optical traps made of the super-oscillating part of such beams exhibit superior…
Interfacing cold atoms with integrated nanophotonic devices could offer new paradigms for engineering atom-light interactions and provide a potentially scalable route for quantum sensing, metrology, and quantum information processing.…