Related papers: Diffraction-free subwavelength-beam optics
It is a fundamental fact of waves that they spread as they evolve freely, regardless of their nature. Previous research to overcome diffraction spreading has led to idealized waves that, in real settings, exhibit quasi-non-diffraction and…
Pulsed Bessel beams of light propagating in free-space experience diffraction effects that resemble those of anomalous dispersion on pulse propagation. It is then shown that a pulsed Bessel beam in a normally dispersive material can remain…
Light refraction, i.e. the bending of the path of a light wave at the interface between two different dielectric media, is ubiquitous in optics. Refraction arises from the different speed of light and is unavoidable in continuous media…
Diffraction-free optical beams propagate freely without change in shape and scale. Monochromatic beams that avoid diffractive spreading require two-dimensional transverse profiles, and there are no corresponding solutions for profiles…
Diffraction limits the behaviour of light in optical systems and sets the smallest achievable line width at half the wavelength. With a novel subwavelength plasmonic lens to reduce the diffraction via an asymmetry and to generate and…
A light beam propagating with an infinite anti-diffracting distance requires infinite power to preserve its shape. However, the fundamental barrier of finite power in free space has made the problem of diffraction insurmountable over the…
The theory of nonlinear diffraction of intensive light beams propagating through photorefractive media is developed. Diffraction occurs on a reflecting wire embedded in the nonlinear medium at relatively small angle with respect to the…
We show that diffraction of electromagnetic radiation (in particular of a visible light) can disappear in propagation through materials with periodically in space modulated refraction index, i.e. photonic crystals. In this way the light…
Surface topography dictates the deterministic functionality of diffraction by a surface. In order to maximize the efficiency with which a diffractive optical component, such as a grating or a diffractive lens, directs light into a chosen…
The propagation and transmission of Bessel beams through nano-layered structures has been discussed recently. Within this framework we recognize the formation of unguided diffraction-free waves with the spot size approaching and…
We demonstrate numerically the diffraction-free propagation of sub-wavelength sized optical beams through simple elements built of metal-dielectric multilayers. The proposed metamaterial consists of silver and a high refractive index…
The concept of the diffraction limit put forth by Ernst Abbe and others has been an important guiding principle limiting our ability to tightly focus classical waves, such as light and sound, in the far field. In the past decade, numerous…
Extremely anisotropic metal-dielectric multilayer metamaterials are designed to have the effective permittivity tensor of a transverse component (parallel to the interfaces of the multilayer) with zero real part and a longitudinal component…
Limited-diffraction beams are a class of waves that may be localized in space and time. Theoretically, these beams are propagation invariant and can propagate to an infinite distance without spreading. In practice, when these beams are…
We theoretically describe the quasi one-dimensional transverse spreading of a light pulse propagating in a nonlinear optical material in the presence of a uniform background light intensity. For short propagation distances the pulse can be…
The diffractive nature of light has limited optics and photonics to operate at scales much larger than the wavelength of light. The major challenge in scaling-down integrated photonics is how to mold the light flow below diffraction-limit…
In Optics it is common to split up the formal analysis of diffraction according to two convenient approximations, in the near and far fields (also known as the Fresnel and Fraunhofer regimes, respectively). Within this scenario, geometrical…
We suggest a scheme to manipulate paraxial diffraction by utilizing the dependency of a four-wave mixing process on the relative angle between the light fields. A microscopic model for four-wave mixing in a Lambda-type level structure is…
Free-space propagation can be described as a shearing of the Wigner distribution function in the spatial coordinate; this shearing is linear in paraxial approximation but assumes a more complex shape for wide-angle propagation. Integration…
Optical absorption is usually considered deleterious, something to avoid if at all possible. We propose a broadband nanoabsorber that completely eliminates the diffracting wave, resulting in a subwavelength enhancement of the field.…