Optics and photonics articles within Nature Materials

Featured

  • Article |

    A pump–push–probe time-resolved technique is developed to characterize the dynamics of photoexcitations at buried, disordered interfaces. Applied to organic bulk heterojunctions, the method provides insight on charge separation in photovoltaic films.

    • Andreas C. Jakowetz
    • , Marcus L. Böhm
    •  & Richard H. Friend

  • Editorial |

    As the family of 2D materials expands to include transition metal dichalcogenides and Xenes, novel fundamental properties and applications come to light.

  • News & Views |

    X-ray imaging in three dimensions is now possible from a set of 2D coherent Bragg diffraction patterns. This approach overcomes the necessity of having to rotate the sample for a 3D reconstruction.

    • Ian Robinson
    •  & Xiaojing Huang

  • News & Views |

    A miniaturized camera has been developed by integrating a planar metasurface lens doublet with a CMOS image sensor. The metasurface lens doublet corrects the monochromatic aberration and thus delivers nearly diffraction-limited image quality over a wide field of view.

    • Cheng Sun

  • News & Views |

    The thermal conductivities of superatom crystals have significant contributions from extended phonon states and show a remarkable temperature dependence due to orientational ordering.

    • Longji Cui
    • , Edgar Meyhofer
    •  & Pramod Reddy

  • Article |

    Acoustically opaque glass can regain its transparency through coherently driven fields. Combining experiments and theory, the phononic saturation process is presented as analogous to the spectral hole burning process.

    • R. O. Behunin
    • , P. Kharel
    •  & P. T. Rakich

  • Letter |

    A theoretically proposed photonic crystal design with valley-dependent spin-split bulk bands allows for the independent control of valley and topology in a single system.

    • Jian-Wen Dong
    • , Xiao-Dong Chen
    •  & Xiang Zhang

  • Review Article |

    This Review discusses the properties of polariton modes (plasmon, phonon and exciton) in graphene, hexagonal boron nitride and transition metal dichalcogenides for applications across the terahertz to visible spectrum.

    • Tony Low
    • , Andrey Chaves
    •  & Frank Koppens

  • News & Views |

    In the past decade, artificial materials with unusual wave interactions have significantly evolved and matured. In honour of the tenth anniversary of the premiere metamaterials conference, we look at the directions in which this field is evolving, and its impact on technology.

    • Andrea Alù

  • Editorial |

    Commercialization of exciton–polariton research as well as investigation of exciting physical phenomena in exciton–polariton condensates relies on improving material properties.

  • Commentary |

    Although exciton–polariton lasers have been experimentally demonstrated in a variety of material systems, robust practical implementations are still challenging. Similarities with atomic Bose–Einstein condensates make the system suitable for chip-based quantum simulators for non-trivial many-body physics.

    • Michael D. Fraser
    • , Sven Höfling
    •  & Yoshihisa Yamamoto

  • Letter |

    A device is presented that can detect mid-infrared plasmons in graphene encapsulated by hexagonal boron nitride via the thermoelectric effect; the natural decay product of the plasmons (electronic heat) is converted into a measurable voltage signal.

    • Mark B. Lundeberg
    • , Yuanda Gao
    •  & Frank H. L. Koppens

  • News & Views |

    Ultra-low-power electronic switching of stable exciton–polariton spin states has now been achieved in a semiconductor microcavity. This opens a new route to the integration of spin-based photonics and electronics.

    • T. C. H. Liew

  • News & Views |

    A rewritable platform for subwavelength optical components is demonstrated by combining surface phonon–polaritons, sustained in a polar dielectric layer, with the switching functionality provided by a phase-change material.

    • Isabelle Staude
    •  & Carsten Rockstuhl

  • Article |

    A large-area fabrication approach to achieve three-dimensional architectured metamaterials, with structural features spanning seven orders of magnitude, results in advanced mechanical properties, including high elasticity.

    • Xiaoyu Zheng
    • , William Smith
    •  & Christopher M. Spadaccini

  • News & Views |

    Giant Rydberg excitons reveal signatures of quantum chaotic behaviour in the presence of time-reversal symmetry breaking enforced by the background solid-state lattice, and they provide a new mesoscopic platform for fundamental studies of quantum chaos.

    • Elena A. Ostrovskaya
    •  & Franco Nori

  • News & Views |

    Laser-generated exciton–polariton condensates in transition metal dichalcogenide heterostructures may trigger Cooper pairing of electrons and induce high-temperature superconductivity.

    • Alexey Kavokin
    •  & Pavlos Lagoudakis

  • Article |

    The photocurrent generated in organic photodetectors and solar cells can be enhanced by increasing light absorption in the active layer. It is now shown that an extended persistence length can increase the oscillator strength of conjugated polymers.

    • Michelle S. Vezie
    • , Sheridan Few
    •  & Jenny Nelson

  • News & Views |

    Researchers have experimentally demonstrated a new type of pathway for electromagnetic waves, which allows an easy reconfiguration into various shapes while significantly suppressing backscattering.

    • Bo Zhen
    •  & Marin Soljačić

  • Article |

    Applying an external magnetic field to cuprous oxide causes the energy spacings in the exciton spectrum to transition from a Poissonian distribution to one governed by the Gaussian unitary ensemble statistics, revealing a signature of quantum chaos.

    • Marc Aßmann
    • , Johannes Thewes
    •  & Manfred Bayer

  • News & Views |

    Macroscopic deformation can induce chirality in initially achiral nanoparticle composites, and reversibly modulate their chiroptical properties.

    • Daeyeon Lee
    •  & Sang Eon Han

  • Progress Article |

    A review on toroidal excitations, from static toroidal moments in condensed matter, to dynamic toroidal multipoles demonstrated experimentally with metamaterials.

    • N. Papasimakis
    • , V. A. Fedotov
    •  & N. I. Zheludev

  • Editorial |

    The Extreme Light Infrastructure (ELI) project is dedicated to the investigation of light–matter interactions at high laser intensities and on short timescales.

  • Article |

    A renally cleared, water-soluble dye emitting in the near-infrared-imaging (NIR)-II window outperforms a clinically approved NIR-I dye in the in vivo imaging of tumours and their nearby blood and lymphatic vasculatures.

    • Alexander L. Antaris
    • , Hao Chen
    •  & Hongjie Dai

  • News & Views |

    The propagation of plasmons in graphene–hexagonal boron nitride moiré patterns is experimentally studied for the first time via infrared scattering near-field optical spectroscopy.

    • Marco Polini
    •  & Frank H. L. Koppens

  • Article |

    Graphene/hBN moiré superlattices exhibit a new set of Dirac mini-bands, whose interband transitions—together with free electrons in the ordinary Dirac bands—modify the nature of the plasmons, as revealed by infrared near-field microscopy.

    • G. X. Ni
    • , H. Wang
    •  & D. N. Basov

  • News & Views |

    Ultrathin, flexible and lightweight perovskite solar cells with improved stability in air can now power model airplanes for several hours.

    • Michele Sessolo
    •  & Henk J. Bolink

  • News & Views |

    Solid-state organic materials that convert low-power visible light into higher-energy radiation have been synthesized using metal–organic frameworks. This approach could be used to make polymers that increase the efficiency of photovoltaic devices.

    • Yoan C. Simon
    •  & Christoph Weder

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