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Single-pass optical parametric amplification is demonstrated following propagation though an atomically thin semiconducting transition metal dichalcogenide. The demonstration may lead to atom-sized tunable light sources.
Using a gas-filled anti-resonant-reflection photonic-crystal fibre, a high-brightness table-top source of coherent carrier-envelope-phase-stable waveforms is demonstrated across seven octaves (340 nm to 40,000 nm) with ultraviolet peak powers up to 2.5 MW and terahertz peak powers of 1.8 MW, without the need for changing nonlinear crystals.
Researchers demonstrate vectorial optomechanical effects using a nematic liquid crystal and report creation of multiple self-induced lenses from a single beam.
A spin–orbit coupling effect in photonic graphene made of coupled polaritonic microcavities is experimentally realized, revealing the unique fine structure of the eigenstates around the Dirac points, with the formation of a Dresselhaus-like effective magnetic field that can be mapped to a non-Abelian gauge field.
Real-space mid-infrared nanoimaging reveals vibrational strong coupling between molecules and propagating phonon polaritons in unstructured, thin hexagonal boron nitride layers, which could provide a platform for testing strong coupling and local control of chemical properties.
A method to control the topological properties of two-dimensional (2D) materials on few-femtosecond timescales is proposed. By controlling the sub-cycle structure of non-resonant driving fields, it may be possible to coherently write, manipulate and read selective valley excitation.
Sculpting and focusing femtosecond cylindrical vector vortex pulses by a slit allows the controllable transformation of the photon’s orbital angular momentum into spin angular momentum, which can be characterized in situ by a strong-field ionization experiment.
Inhomogeneity of the photogenerated carrier spacetime distribution enables transient symmetry breaking in a metasurface. As a result, broadband transient dichroism is demonstrated.
Strongly correlated photon states are achieved using only weak coupling thanks to an ensemble of non-interacting waveguide-coupled atoms and collectively enhanced nonlinear interactions.
An experimental study of the second-harmonic-generation process in a beta barium borate crystal shows that homogeneous optical crystals can exhibit the rich physics of the spin–orbit angular momentum cascade in the nonlinear optical regime.
Moiré lattices optically induced in photorefractive nonlinear media are used to explain the formation of optical solitons under different geometrical conditions controlled by the twisting angle between the constitutive sublattices.
The findings that the spatial distribution of an optical field with vortex phase profile can be imprinted coherently onto a propagating electron wave reveal new aspects of light–matter interactions and will help develop future single-photon electron spectroscopy.
Gold atoms were stripped of up to 72 electrons by irradiating gold foils and nanowire arrays with a relativistic 400 nm laser pulse. This work will open the door to the study of the atomic physics of highly charged atoms in very-high-density plasmas.
Observations of decoherence from thermodynamic noise in microresonator soliton frequency combs and laser cooling that reduces soliton thermal decoherence to far below the ambient-temperature limit are described, linking nonlinear photonics and microscopic fluctuations.
An appropriately designed pulsed beam crossing an interface is shown to enable phenomena including anomalous group-velocity increase in higher-index materials, and tunable group velocity by varying the angle of incidence.
Owing to the superlattice-induced bandgap and superlattice-enhanced density of states, small-twist-angled (<2°) bilayer graphene exhibits a strong gate-tunable photoresponse in the mid-infrared regime of 5 to 12 μm, reaching an extrinsic peak responsivity of 26 mA W−1 at 12 μm.
Exploiting two-dimensional metamaterials, the direction of emission from InGaN/GaN quantum wells is engineered while simultaneously improving quantum efficiency.
A pair of transportable optical lattice clocks with 10−18 uncertainty is developed. The relativistic redshift predicted by the theory of general relativity has been tested at the 10–5 level by the two optical clocks with a height difference of 450 m on the ground.