DTU Fotonik Researchers in Optics & Photonics’ Special Edition 2016

Lasers Light sources Optics

A special edition of Optics & Photonics News has highlighted the 30 most important optics research breakthroughs in 2016. The featured publications are from prominent researchers from around the globe, and they include N. Asger Mortensen and Niels Gregersen from DTU Fotonik.

Professor N. Asger Mortensen and Assoc. Professor Niels Gregersen have been selected for their work with respectively metasurfaces and quantum optics.

Niels Gregersen is contributing with the publication “An Efficient, High-Quality Single-Photon Source” in whichhe, in collaboration with German and Chinese universities, demonstrates a single-photon source. This light source represents a key component in optical implementations of the quantum computer, which in turn promises calculation power superior to any classical computer. A single-photon source must possess three qualities: high purity, photon indistinguishability and efficiency. Until now it has not been possible to combine these qualities in a single-photon source, but Niels Gregersen and coworkers have developed a source that combine them in a single device and, thus, overcome the efficiency-quality dilemma.

Meanwhile, in a collaboration between DTU Nanotech and DTU Fotonik, the groups of Anders Kristensen and N. Asger Mortensen have had their work on “Plasmon-Assisted Color Laser Printing” featured. The publication outlines how we can print the final patterns of color printing with an ink-free portable laser printer on a generic, mass-producible plasmonic substrate made by nanoimprinting. Consequently, we can print color logos with features as small as 200 nm using a palm-sized laser. These could be candidates for the smallest laser-printed figures in the world. The method potentially eliminates some of the major problems with color printing, including the recycling problems that are associated with products based on chemical colorants, and the problems with scaling up and maintaining low costs associated with printing with e-beam lithography. 

Read the publications here.