Nature Photonics - Current issue : November 2008 - Vol 2 No 11
- The airy–beam particle blower
- Biocompatible optics: The promise of silk
- Photovoltaics: Bifacial dye solar cells
- Photonic–crystal fibre: Ultrashort–pulse propagation
Latest highlights
Technology focus
Optical metrology is an attractive method for product quality checking owing to its resolution, speed and non–contact approach. It also has the advantages that it is potentially much more cost–effective and practical than competing non-optical techniques.
Focus
Slow light
Focus issue
Control over the velocity of light pulses leads to a host of exciting opportunities. In this special Focus issue, we present a collection of articles that describe the evolution of the field, the fundamental physics and the different approaches that are developing.
Advance online publication
Ultrafast lasers
Letter by Kim et al.
Femtosecond–scale synchronization using mode–locked lasers has been limited to periods of just a few minutes. Now it is shown that, by combining a number of laser techniques, sub–10–fs–precision synchronization of remote lasers and microwave sources is possible for more than 10 hours.
Current Issue
Solar cells
Article by Ito et al.
Low–cost, efficient solar cells are sought as an alternative to silicon photovoltaics. Here a dye–based bifacial solar cell that is capable of efficient generation of electricity for light incident on either its front or rear face is demonstrated.
Current Issue
Photonic crystal fibres
Letter by Skibina et al.
Hollow–core photonic–crystal fibres enable confinement of light on a much tighter scale than is possible with conventional fibre. But dispersion makes it difficult to transmit very short, sub 100 fs, pulses over long distances. A chirped structure could offer a solution.
Current Issue
3D photonic crystals
Article by Aoki et al.
A design of on–chip optomechanical resonator that simultaneously maximizes a high mechanical Q–factor in the megahertz range and an ultrahigh optical finesse is reported. This structure enables the first direct observation of mechanical normal–mode coupling in a micromechanical system.