Optics & Photonics News

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Scientists Use Laser Tweezers to Sort Atoms

Physicists of the University of Bonn have taken one more important hurdle on the path to what is known as a quantum computer: by using 'laser tweezers' they have succeeded in sorting up to seven atoms and lining them up.

5 Jul 2007

Large Study Evaluates Laser Treatment for AMD Vision Loss

According to a study that appears in the November 2006 issue of the journal Ophthalmology, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and 21 other clinical centers have found that low-intensity laser treatment - thought to be potentially beneficial in slowing or preventing the loss of vision from age-related macular degeneration (AMD) - is ineffective in preventing complications of AMD or vision loss.

5 Jul 2007

Lasers Used to Cool and Trap Erbium Atoms

Physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have used lasers to cool and trap erbium atoms, a "rare earth" heavy metal with unusual optical, electronic and magnetic properties.

5 Jul 2007

New Book, Laser Beam Shaping Applications

Following up on their well-received first book, Laser Beam Shaping: Theory and Techniques, Sandia National Laboratories researchers Fred Dickey and Scott Holswade have edited (with David Shealy of the University of Alabama at Birmingham) a compact new volume, Laser Beam Shaping Applications.

5 Jul 2007

New Photonic Device for Greater Optical Data Storage

Engineers and applied scientists from Harvard University have demonstrated a new photonic device with a wide range of potential commercial applications, including dramatically higher capacity for optical data storage.

5 Jul 2007

ESA's GIOVE-A Laser Ranging Campaign Successful

Fourteen laser ranging stations participated in a campaign to track ESA's GIOVE-A satellite during the spring and summer of 2006, providing invaluable data for the characterisation of the satellite's on-board clock.

5 Jul 2007

New Laser-Based Technique Provides First Non-Invasive Test to Measure Skin Aging

Physicists and medical researchers for the first time have demonstrated a new technique that non-invasively measures in real time the level of damage to the skin from sun exposure and aging, and initial results suggest that women's skin ages faster than men's.

5 Jul 2007

Solvay and Georgia Tech Ink Deal on OLED Research

The Georgia Institute of Technology's Center for Organic Photonics and Electronics (COPE) and Solvay announced a $3 million deal for OLED research today.

5 Jul 2007

World's Most Powerful Tunable Laser Shatters Another Power Record

The most powerful tunable laser in the world just shattered another power record: the Free-Electron Laser (FEL), supported by the Office of Naval Research and located at the U.S. Department of Energy's Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility (Jefferson Lab), produced a 14.2 kilowatt (kW) beam of laser light at an infrared wavelength of 1.61 microns on October 30.

5 Jul 2007

Adaptive Optics Help Sharpen Night Sky

An artificial, laser-fed star now shines regularly over the sky of Paranal, home of ESO's Very Large Telescope, one of the world's most advanced large ground-based telescopes.

5 Jul 2007

New Wave of Fiber Research

Cotton may be getting even more breathable. A new wave of fiber research debuts with an international science and technology conference.

5 Jul 2007

Frictionless Optics for ESA's Darwin Mission

The multi-satellite Darwin mission will use optical interferometry in which at least three separate orbiting telescopes jointly operate as an equivalent single telescope with a much larger effective aperture, thus achieving the required resolution.

5 Jul 2007

Electrons Observed in Tunnelling Process

We have to climb a mountain in order to conquer it. In quantum physics there is a different way - objects can reach the opposite side of a hill simply by tunnelling through it, instead of laboriously climbing over it.

5 Jul 2007

Dr. Peli of Schepens Eye Research Institute Elected SPIE Fellow

The International Society for Optical Engineering will honor 56 new Fellows of the Society this year.

5 Jul 2007

New Type of Diode Laser

A new type of diode laser, called the quantum cascade laser (QCL), may eventually change this situation. Diode lasers are inherently compact and suitable for mass-production, which has led to their widespread and low-cost use in everyday products, including CD and DVD players.

5 Jul 2007