Optical materials and elements, considered as a physical system, comprise engineered media and components that manipulate electromagnetic radiation in the optical frequency range through controlled refraction, reflection, diffraction, absorption, and emission. This system includes bulk and nanostructured dielectrics, semiconductors, and metals configured as lenses, mirrors, prisms, gratings, filters, waveplates, and coatings, characterized by parameters such as complex refractive index, dispersion, nonlinear susceptibilities, and anisotropy. Their collective behavior determines wavefront shaping, spectral and polarization control, and spatiotemporal light propagation, underpinning the performance of optical assemblies in imaging, beam delivery, photonic integration, and laser systems.
Light does a lot of work in the modern world, enabling all types of information technology, from TVs to satellites to fiber-optic cables that carry the internet across oceans. Stanford physicists recently found a way to make ...
Optics & Photonics
Jan 28, 2026
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Quantum computing represents a potential breakthrough technology that could far surpass the technical limitations of modern-day computing systems for some tasks. However, putting together practical, large-scale quantum computers ...
Optics & Photonics
Jan 27, 2026
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Many organisms leverage showy colors for attracting mates. Because color is a property of light (determined by its wavelength), it is easy for humans to see how these colors are used in animal courting rituals. Less obvious ...
Sunbeams contain a lot of energy. But current technology for harvesting solar power doesn't capture as much as it could. Now, in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, researchers report that gold nanospheres, named supraballs, ...
Nanomaterials
Jan 27, 2026
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Across the physical world, many intricate structures form via symmetry breaking. When a system with inherent symmetry transitions into an ordered state, it can form stable imperfections known as topological defects. Such ...
Nanomaterials
Jan 27, 2026
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Transparent electrodes transmit light while conducting electricity and are increasingly important in bioelectronic and optoelectronic devices. Their combination of high optical transparency, low electrical resistance, and ...
Nanomaterials
Jan 26, 2026
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Deep-ultraviolet (DUV, λ < 200 nm) all-solid-state lasers, essential to modern scientific research and industrial manufacturing, are widely applied in fields from material analysis to lithography. Their commercialization ...
Condensed Matter
Jan 25, 2026
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30
Skoltech researchers and their colleagues from Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany, Nanjing University of China, and the National Institute for Materials Science of Japan have developed a method for depositing ...
Nanophysics
Jan 24, 2026
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The interaction of silver materials with light is well-known as the basis of film photography. But, there are much more sophisticated interactions when we consider very, very small particles of silver that could have applications ...
Nanophysics
Jan 21, 2026
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Researchers from the Institute of Physics in Zagreb have shown that depositing a thin layer of organic molecules on two-dimensional (2D) semiconductors can improve their optical properties and even repair defects. Their work, ...
Nanomaterials
Jan 17, 2026
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