In a first for the field, researchers from The Grainger College of Engineering at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign ...

A team of researchers has developed a novel method for using cholesteric liquid crystals in optical microcavities. The platform created by the researchers enables the formation and dynamic tuning of ...

Researchers at the University of Illinois have pulled off a laser first: they built a new kind of eye-safe laser that works ...

Photonic-crystal surface-emitting laser (PCSEL) is a promising technology that can completely revolutionize what lasers ...

Photonic crystal structures can be used to control the spectral distribution of thermal emission. Here, Arpin et al. demonstrate three-dimensional tungsten and hafnium diboride photonic crystals ...

Photonic crystals have been one of the hottest topics in optics in the last 10 years. This research is born out of a desire to have precise control over light—similar to the semiconductor ...

New photonic crystals have both electronic and optical properties Date: July 25, 2011 Source: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Summary: In an advance that could open new avenues for ...

The eye-shaped sensor finds cancer cells early. It works even with small mistakes or heat changes, making it useful for real ...

Photonic crystals are made of layered semiconductors, with the precise structure (the thickness and spacing of the layers) determining how they interact with light—it's possible to make ...

Photonic crystals can control the flow of light but they are extremely sensitive to structural disorder. Although this often degrades performance, disorder can actually be used to enhance light ...

Photonic crystals are nanostructured materials with a refractive index that varies on a length scale similar to the wavelength of visible light. This periodic variation produces a so-called “photonic ...

Photonic crystals could come into their own here by "redirecting" unabsorbed photons back into the silicon. The photonic crystal layer would simply need to be "glued" to the back of a solar cell in ...