Researchers have shown that hooded seals native to the Arctic Ocean and North Atlantic have eyes that are extremely sensitive to ultraviolet (UV) light, enabling them to spot polar bears that would usually be camouflaged ...
Plants & Animals
Jul 3, 2015
0
78
Optical fibers are hair-like threads of glass used to guide light. Fibers of exceptional purity have proved an excellent way of sending information over long distances and are the foundation of modern telecommunication systems. ...
Optics & Photonics
Jun 15, 2015
0
99
At any given moment, our sun emits a range of light waves far more expansive than what our eyes alone can see: from visible light to extreme ultraviolet to soft and hard X-rays. Different wavelengths can have different effects ...
Space Exploration
Mar 24, 2015
0
298
Borrowing a trick from nature, engineers from the University of California at Berkeley have created an incredibly thin, chameleon-like material that can be made to change color—on demand—by simply applying a minute amount ...
Optics & Photonics
Mar 12, 2015
3
5186
Dust particles smaller than about a wavelength of light are abundant in our solar system, created by collisions between asteroids and from the evaporation of comets. As they scatter sunlight, these particles produce the zodiacal ...
Astronomy
Mar 9, 2015
4
53
A theory borrowed from physics to understand how electrons move in semiconductors may explain the silvery mirror-like appearance of many fish, recent research suggests.
General Physics
Feb 25, 2015
0
49
Most lenses are, by definition, curved. After all, they are named for their resemblance to lentils, and a glass lens made flat is just a window with no special powers. But a new type of lens created at the Harvard School ...
Optics & Photonics
Feb 19, 2015
2
2901
A research team led by North Carolina State University has identified and synthesized a material that can be used to create efficient plasmonic devices that respond to light in the mid-infrared (IR) range. This is the first ...
Condensed Matter
Feb 16, 2015
0
41
Squeezing light into tiny circuits and controlling its flow electrically is a holy grail that has become a realistic scenario thanks to the discovery of graphene. This tantalizing achievement is realized by exploiting so-called ...
Nanomaterials
Jan 12, 2015
2
31
U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) scientists, in collaboration with researchers from the University of Manchester, U.K.; Imperial College, London; University of California San Diego; and the National Institute of Material ...
Optics & Photonics
Nov 20, 2014
0
0
