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Switching the handedness of circularly polarized light requires separately controlling the phases of orthogonal components while maintaining their magnitudes, ideally with gigahertz operation rates. Ultrafast switching has now been realized via all-optical control of birefringent metamaterials.
Simultaneous trapping, alignment and anti-Stokes fluorescence cooling of Yb3+:YLF nanocrystals from room temperature to temperatures as low as about 130 K can now be realized using a single-beam optical dipole trap within a low-pressure environment.
An innovative data transmission protocol that effectively makes an optical fibre link linear in its behaviour is shown to benefit high-speed, long-distance optical communication operating at high signal powers.
Room-temperature single-photon emission at several wavelengths in the near-infrared, including the telecom window, is realized by organic colour centres chemically implanted on chirality-defined single-walled carbon nanotubes.
The generation and manipulation of cavity solitons in microresonators is creating new opportunities for Kerr combs to aid applications such as optical communications and spectroscopy.
The importance of the Fano resonance concept is recognized across multiple fields of physics. In this Review, Fano resonance is explored in the context of optics, with particular emphasis on dielectric nanostructures and metasurfaces.
The realization of satellite-to-ground quantum cryptography would make quantum-secured communications possible on a global scale. Four recent breakthroughs suggest that this compelling capability could be achieved by the end of this decade.
Ultrathin, versatile, integrated optical devices and high-speed optical information processing could be the upcoming real-world opportunities of plasmonic metasurfaces.
Spin–valley coupling in transition metal dichalcogenides has been shown to persist at room temperature when excitons are coherently coupled to cavity photons.
Significant improvements in the loss and drive voltage of silicon photonics-based optical phase modulators look set to benefit both short-reach and long-distance data communications.
Materials whose optical properties can be reconfigured are crucial for photonic applications such as optical memories. Phase-change materials offer such utility and here recent progress is reviewed.
An external 'tuning knob' by means of applying a transverse electric field has been experimentally demonstrated to modify the bandgap of black phosphorus, making the two-dimensional material practical for integration in functional nanodevices.
Two concurrent demonstrations of programmable photonic processors based on large meshes of interconnected waveguides on a silicon chip provide new hope for optical information processing.
Reports of photon–photon interaction experiments, novel imaging schemes and state-of-the-art mirrors were highlights of the recent International Conference on X-ray Optics and Applications in Yokohama, Japan.
