High Performance Beam Steering via Tunable Liquid Prisms

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Enrico Clement ◽  
Sung-Yong Park
Keyword(s):  
High Performance ◽  
Beam Steering ◽  
Fluid Interfaces ◽  
Optical Components ◽  
Wide Beam ◽  
Liquid Lenses ◽  
Refractive Index Difference ◽  
Control Fluid ◽  
532 Nm ◽  
Incoming Light

The use of liquids for the manipulation of light has many advantages over their conventional solid counterparts. With the emergence of microfluidic technologies to control fluid interfaces, various devices capable of replacing conventional optical components have been developed. Because liquids are intrinsically smooth and can change shape or form, they have been utilized for highly versatile components to manipulate light with high degrees of control using optofluidic technologies. Liquid lenses and beam steering devices are among the typical optofluidic devices that have gained much interest over recent years. In this work, we present high-performance tunable liquid prisms capable of wide beam steering of incoming light. By using the electrowetting phenomena, we are able to modulate the fluid-fluid interface at which beam steering occurs. Optical analyses were conducted to study the effect of liquid selection in the effectiveness of our prisms. Furthermore, the double-stacked prism configuration is proposed to achieve wide beam steering and its performance is compared with that of a single prism for different liquid selections. Finally, our analytical studies have been experimentally demonstrated. We successfully fabricated the tunable liquid prism filled with water and 1-bromonaphthalene (1-BN). Due to large refractive index difference between two liquids (nwater = 1.33 and n1−BN = 1.65 at λ = 532 nm), high-performance beam steering was enabled. With an apex angle of 25°, we were able to experimentally demonstrate a beam steering of β ≤ 8.82° with the single prism configuration. It was significantly improved up to β ≤ 17.04° for the double-stacked prism.

scholarly journals Liquid Crystal Devices for Beam Steering Applications

Micromachines ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 247
Author(s):  
Rowan Morris ◽  
Cliff Jones ◽  
Mamatha Nagaraj
Keyword(s):  
Liquid Crystal ◽  
Liquid Crystals ◽  
Adaptive Optics ◽  
Beam Steering ◽  
Optical Components ◽  
Advantages And Disadvantages ◽  
Liquid Crystal Devices

Liquid crystals are valuable materials for applications in beam steering devices. In this paper, an overview of the use of liquid crystals in the field of adaptive optics specifically for beam steering and lensing devices is presented. The paper introduces the properties of liquid crystals that have made them useful in this field followed by a more detailed discussion of specific liquid crystal devices that act as switchable optical components of refractive and diffractive types. The relative advantages and disadvantages of the different devices and techniques are summarised.

scholarly journals A Review on the Development of Rotman Lens Antenna

2014 ◽  
Vol 2014 ◽  
pp. 1-9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shruti Vashist ◽  
M. K. Soni ◽  
P. K. Singhal
Keyword(s):  
High Performance ◽  
Beam Steering ◽  
Phase Error ◽  
Antenna System ◽  
Surveillance Systems ◽  
Electronic Warfare ◽  
Design Concepts ◽  
Low Profile ◽  
True Time ◽  
The One

Rotman lenses are the beguiling devices used by the beamforming networks (BFNs). These lenses are generally used in the radar surveillance systems to see targets in multiple directions due to its multibeam capability without physically moving the antenna system. Now a days these lenses are being integrated into many radars and electronic warfare systems around the world. The antenna should be capable of producing multiple beams which can be steered without changing the orientation of the antenna. Microwave lenses are the one who support low-phase error, wideband, and wide-angle scanning. They are the true time delay (TTD) devices producing frequency independent beam steering. The emerging printed lenses in recent years have facilitated the advancement of designing high performance but low-profile, light-weight, and small-size and networks (BFNs). This paper will review and analyze various design concepts used over the years to improve the scanning capability of the lens developed by various researchers.

scholarly journals Microwave Liquid Crystal Technology

Crystals ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 355 ◽  
Author(s):  
Holger Maune ◽  
Matthias Jost ◽  
Roland Reese ◽  
Ersin Polat ◽  
Matthias Nickel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Liquid Crystal ◽  
Millimeter Wave ◽  
Antenna Arrays ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Beam Steering ◽  
Phase Shifters ◽  
Dielectric Waveguides ◽  
Microwave Components ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Rectangular Waveguides

Tunable Liquid Crystal (LC)-based microwave components are of increasing interest in academia and industry. Based on these components, numerous applications can be targeted such as tunable microwave filters and beam-steering antenna systems. With the commercialization of first LC-steered antennas for Ku-band e.g., by Kymeta and Alcan Systems, LC-based microwave components left early research stages behind. With the introduction of terrestrial 5G communications systems, moving to millimeter-wave communication, these systems can benefit from the unique properties of LC in terms of material quality. In this paper, we show recent developments in millimeter wave phase shifters for antenna arrays. The limits of classical high-performance metallic rectangular waveguides are clearly identified. A new implementation with dielectric waveguides is presented and compared to classic approaches.

scholarly journals The Flexiscope: a low cost, flexible, convertible and modular microscope with automated scanning and micromanipulation

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 191949 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy Courtney ◽  
Luke M. Alvey ◽  
George O. T. Merces ◽  
Niamh Burke ◽  
Mark Pickering
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Design ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Cost Savings ◽  
Fluorescent Imaging ◽  
Multiple Roles ◽  
Flexible Work ◽  
Optical Components ◽  
Automated Scanning

With technologies rapidly evolving, many research institutions are now opting to invest in costly, high-quality, specialized microscopes which are shared by many researchers. As a consequence, the user may not have the ability to adapt a microscope to their specific needs and limitations in experimental design are introduced. A flexible work-horse microscopy system is a valuable tool in any laboratory to meet the diverse needs of a research team and promote innovation in experimental design. We have developed the Flexiscope; a multi-functional, adaptable, efficient and high-performance microscopy/electrophysiology system for everyday applications in a neurobiology laboratory. The core optical components are relatively constant in the three configurations described here: an upright configuration, an inverted configuration and an upright/electrophysiology configuration. We have provided a comprehensive description of the Flexiscope. We show that this method is capable of oblique infrared illumination imaging, multi-channel fluorescent imaging and automated three-dimensional scanning of larger specimens. Image quality is conserved across the three configurations of the microscope, and conversion between configurations is possible quickly and easily, while the motion control system can be repurposed to allow sub-micrometre computer-controlled micromanipulation. The Flexiscope provides similar performance and usability to commercially available systems. However, as it can be easily reconfigured for multiple roles, it can remove the need to purchase multiple microscopes, giving significant cost savings. The modular reconfigurable nature allows the user to customize the system to their specific needs and adapt/upgrade the system as challenges arise, without requiring specialized technical skills.

scholarly journals Spin-dependent optics with metasurfaces

Nanophotonics ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 215-234 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shiyi Xiao ◽  
Jiarong Wang ◽  
Fu Liu ◽  
Shuang Zhang ◽  
Xiaobo Yin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Degrees Of Freedom ◽  
Condensed Matter ◽  
Beam Steering ◽  
Orbit Interaction ◽  
Optical Components ◽  
Geometric Phases ◽  
New Era ◽  
Matter Interaction ◽  
Light Matter Interaction ◽  
Light Generation

AbstractOptical spin-Hall effect (OSHE) is a spin-dependent transportation phenomenon of light as an analogy to its counterpart in condensed matter physics. Although being predicted and observed for decades, this effect has recently attracted enormous interests due to the development of metamaterials and metasurfaces, which can provide us tailor-made control of the light-matter interaction and spin-orbit interaction. In parallel to the developments of OSHE, metasurface gives us opportunities to manipulate OSHE in achieving a stronger response, a higher efficiency, a higher resolution, or more degrees of freedom in controlling the wave front. Here, we give an overview of the OSHE based on metasurface-enabled geometric phases in different kinds of configurational spaces and their applications on spin-dependent beam steering, focusing, holograms, structured light generation, and detection. These developments mark the beginning of a new era of spin-enabled optics for future optical components.

Charge carrier dynamics in small-molecule- and polymer-based donor-acceptor blends

2014 ◽  
Vol 1733 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keshab Paudel ◽  
Brian Johnson ◽  
Mattson Thieme ◽  
John E. Anthony ◽  
Oksana Ostroverkhova
Keyword(s):  
Optical Absorption ◽  
Charge Carrier ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Continuous Wave ◽  
Carrier Dynamics ◽  
Bulk Heterojunctions ◽  
Time Resolved ◽  
Charge Carrier Dynamics ◽  
Donor Acceptor ◽  
532 Nm

ABSTRACTWe present a comparative study of optical absorption, photoluminescence (PL), and photoconductivity in bulk heterojunctions comprising a high performance functionalized anthradithiophene (ADT) derivative or the benchmark polymer P3HT as donor and functionalized pentacene (Pn) derivative or PCBM as acceptor. Of all D/A blends studied, the ADT/PCBM blend exhibited the highest charge photogeneration efficiencies under 532 nm excitation, leading to the highest amplitudes of time-resolved and continuous wave (cw) photocurrents. At nanosecond time scales after photoexcitation, both ADT-TES-F-based blends and the P3HT/Pn-TIPS-F8 blend exhibited photocurrents which were higher by a factor of 2-10, depending on the blend, than that in the P3HT/PCBM blend. However, cw photocurrents showed a different trend, with the ADT-TES-F/PCBM blend exhibiting only a factor of ∼2.5 higher photoresponse than that in the P3HT/PCBM blends, and the ADT-TES-F- and P3HT- based blends with Pn-TIPS-F8 showing a factor of ∼1.5-2.5 lower photoresponse than that in the P3HT/PCBM blend, due to other contributions, such as that of charge trap-limited transport, to cw photoresponse.

scholarly journals Nanosystems, Edge Computing, and the Next Generation Computing Systems

Sensors ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (18) ◽  
pp. 4048 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Passian ◽  
Neena Imam
Keyword(s):  
High Performance ◽  
Single Photon ◽  
Edge Computing ◽  
Next Generation ◽  
Optical Components ◽  
Computing Systems ◽  
Processor Architectures ◽  
Generation Computing ◽  
Multiple Orders ◽  
Requirements Development

It is widely recognized that nanoscience and nanotechnology and their subfields, such as nanophotonics, nanoelectronics, and nanomechanics, have had a tremendous impact on recent advances in sensing, imaging, and communication, with notable developments, including novel transistors and processor architectures. For example, in addition to being supremely fast, optical and photonic components and devices are capable of operating across multiple orders of magnitude length, power, and spectral scales, encompassing the range from macroscopic device sizes and kW energies to atomic domains and single-photon energies. The extreme versatility of the associated electromagnetic phenomena and applications, both classical and quantum, are therefore highly appealing to the rapidly evolving computing and communication realms, where innovations in both hardware and software are necessary to meet the growing speed and memory requirements. Development of all-optical components, photonic chips, interconnects, and processors will bring the speed of light, photon coherence properties, field confinement and enhancement, information-carrying capacity, and the broad spectrum of light into the high-performance computing, the internet of things, and industries related to cloud, fog, and recently edge computing. Conversely, owing to their extraordinary properties, 0D, 1D, and 2D materials are being explored as a physical basis for the next generation of logic components and processors. Carbon nanotubes, for example, have been recently used to create a new processor beyond proof of principle. These developments, in conjunction with neuromorphic and quantum computing, are envisioned to maintain the growth of computing power beyond the projected plateau for silicon technology. We survey the qualitative figures of merit of technologies of current interest for the next generation computing with an emphasis on edge computing.

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