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At least 433 records · Page 24

Dynamics of a Wave Packet of Whispering-Gallery-Mode Type in an Optical Waveguide in the Presence of a Traveling Refractive-Index Wave

It is demonstrated that strong ultrafast modulation of a tunneling wave packet of the whispering-gallery-mode type can be implemented in a cylindrical optical waveguide exhibiting spatiotemporal inhomogeneity induced by a travelling refractive-index wave. The corresponding optical waveguides can be used for efficient generation of picosecond and subpicosecond laser pulses.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Communication: Effect of accidental mode degeneracy on Raman intensity in 2D materials: Hybrid functional study of bilayer phosphorene

Bulk black phosphorus has two optical phonon modes labeled as A{sub g}{sup 2} and B{sub 2u}, respectively, that are nearly degenerate in frequency. However, density functional theory calculations using local or semi-local functionals cannot reproduce this degeneracy. Here, we propose a hybrid functional approach aided by van der Waals (vdW) force fields, which can accurately describe the lattice dynamic and electronic properties of both bulk and few-layer black phosphorus (phosphorene). Using this approach we show that in bilayer phosphorene, the two Raman modes derived from the B{sub 2u} and A{sub g}{sup 2} modes could exhibit strong resonance as a result of the accidental degeneracy so that both modes could be observed in Raman experiment. Without the mode degeneracy, however, the Raman intensity of the B{sub 2u}-derived mode would be too weak to be observed. We further show that the accidental degeneracy is correlated to the applied strain, which enables Raman spectroscopy to be a powerful tool for characterizing built-in strains in 2D materials, e.g., due to the interaction with substrates, which has emerged as an important issue in vdW epitaxy.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗

Optimal mode transformations for linear-optical cluster-state generation

In this paper, we analyze the generation of linear-optical cluster states (LOCSs) via sequential addition of one and two qubits. Existing approaches employ the stochastic linear-optical two-qubit controlled-Z (CZ) gate with success rate of 1/9 per operation. The question of optimality of the CZ gate with respect to LOCS generation has remained open. We report that there are alternative schemes to the CZ gate that are exponentially more efficient and show that sequential LOCS growth is indeed globally optimal. We find that the optimal cluster growth operation is a state transformation on a subspace of the full Hilbert space. Finally, we show that the maximal success rate of postselected entangling n photonic qubits or m Bell pairs into a cluster is (1/2) n-1 and (1/4) m-1 , respectively, with no ancilla photons, and we give an explicit optical description of the optimal mode transformations.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

Phase stability and lattice thermal conductivity reduction in CoSb{sub 3} skutterudites, doped with chalcogen atoms

We report a significant reduction in the lattice thermal conductivity of the CoSb{sub 3} skuttertudites, doped with chalcogen atoms. Te/Se chalcogen atoms doped CoSb{sub 3} skutterudite samples (Te{sub 0.1}Co{sub 4}Sb{sub 12}, Se{sub 0.1}Co{sub 4}Sb{sub 12}, Te{sub 0.05}Se{sub 0.05}Co{sub 4}Sb{sub 12}) are processed by ball milling and spark plasma sintering. X-ray diffraction data combined with energy dispersive X-ray spectra indicate the doping of Te/Se chalcogen atoms in the skutterudite. The temperature dependent X-ray diffraction confirms the stability of the Te/Se doped CoSb{sub 3} skutterudite phase and absence of any secondary phase in the temperature range starting from 300 K to 773 K. The Raman spectroscopy reveals that different chalcogen dopant atoms cause different resonant optical vibrational modes between the dopant atom and the host CoSb{sub 3} skutterudite lattice. These optical vibrational modes do scatter heat carrying acoustic phonons in a different spectral range. It was found that among the Te/Se chalcogen atoms, Te atoms alter the host CoSb{sub 3} skutterudite lattice vibrations to a larger extent than Se atoms, and can potentially scatter more Sb related acoustic phonons. The Debye model of lattice thermal conductivity confirms that the resonant phonon scattering has important contributions to the reduction of lattice thermal conductivity in CoSb{sub 3} skutterudites doped with Te/Se chalcogen atoms. Lattice thermal conductivity ∼ 0.9 W/mK at 773 K is achieved in Te{sub 0.1}Co{sub 4}Sb{sub 12} skutterudites, which is the lowest value reported so far in CoSb{sub 3} skutterudites, doped with single Te chalcogen atom.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗

Optical Isolator For Use With Single-Mode Fiber

Assembly of commercially available components acts as single-mode fiber-optic isolator with lower forward-transmission loss and higher attenuation of reverse transmission than previously achieved in single unit. New design reduces cost and improves performance of optical gyroscopes, precise time- and frequency-signal-distribution systems, and other systems that include fiber optics and isolators.

Lutes, George F.↗

Mode structure of planar optical antennas on dielectric substrates

Here, we report a numerical study, supported by photoemission electron microscopy (PEEM), of sub-micron planar optical antennas on transparent substrate. We find these antennas generate intricate near-field spatial field distributions with odd and even numbers of nodes. We show that the field distributions are primarily superpositions of planar surface plasmon polariton modes confined to the metal/substrate interface. The mode structure provides opportunities for coherent switching and optical control in sub-micron volumes.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Phase Matching of Diverse Modes in a WGM Resonator

Phase matching of diverse electromagnetic modes (specifically, coexisting optical and microwave modes) in a whispering-gallery-mode (WGM) resonator has been predicted theoretically and verified experimentally. Such phase matching is necessary for storage of microwave/terahertz and optical electromagnetic energy in the same resonator, as needed for exploitation of nonlinear optical phenomena. WGM resonators are used in research on nonlinear optical phenomena at low optical intensities and as a basis for design and fabrication of novel optical devices. Examples of nonlinear optical phenomena recently demonstrated in WGM resonators include low-threshold Raman lasing, optomechanical oscillations, frequency doubling, and hyperparametric oscillations. The present findings regarding phase matching were made in research on low-threshold, strongly nondegenerate parametric oscillations in lithium niobate WGM resonators. The principle of operation of such an oscillator is rooted in two previously observed phenomena: (1) stimulated Raman scattering by polaritons in lithium niobate and (2) phase matching of nonlinear optical processes via geometrical confinement of light. The oscillator is partly similar to terahertz oscillators based on lithium niobate crystals, the key difference being that a novel geometrical configuration of this oscillator supports oscillation in the regime. The high resonance quality factors (Q values) typical of WGM resonators make it possible to achieve oscillation at a threshold signal level much lower than that in a non-WGM-resonator lithium niobate crystal.

Savchenkov, Anatoliy↗

Single Mode Air-Clad Single Crystal Sapphire Optical Fiber

The observation of single mode propagation in an air-clad single crystal sapphire optical fiber at wavelengths at and above 783 nm is presented for the first time. A high-temperature wet acid etching method was used to reduce the diameter of a 10 cm length of commercially-sourced sapphire fiber from 125 micrometers to 6.5 micrometers, and far-field imaging provided modal information at intervals as the fiber diameter decreased. Modal volume was shown to decrease with decreasing diameter, and single mode behavior was observed at the minimum diameter achieved. While weakly-guiding approximations are generally inaccurate for low modal volume optical fiber with high core-cladding refractive index disparity, consistency between these approximations and experimental results was observed when the effective numerical aperture was measured and substituted for the theoretical numerical aperture in weakly-guiding approximation calculations. With the demonstration of very low modal volume in sapphire at fiber diameters much larger than anticipated by legacy calculations, the resolution of sapphire fiber distributed sensors may be increased and other sensing schemes requiring very low modal volume, such as fiber Bragg gratings, may be realized in extreme environment applications.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Tomographic and analog 3-D simulations using NORA

The results of two computer simulations demonstrate the feasibility of using the nonoverlapping redundant array (NORA) to form three-dimensional images of objects with X-rays. Pinholes admit the X-rays to nonoverlapping points on a detector. The object is reconstructed in the analog mode by optical correlation and in the digital mode by tomographic computations. Trials were run with a stick-figure pyramid and extended objects with out-of-focus backgrounds. Substitution of spherical optical lenses for the pinholes increased the light transmission sufficiently that objects could be easily viewed in a dark room. Out-of-focus aberrations in tomographic reconstruction could be eliminated using Chang's (1976) algorithm.

Yin, L. I.↗

Effect of nitrogen on the growth of boron doped single crystal diamond

Boron-doped single crystal diamond films were grown homoepitaxially on synthetic (100) Type Ib diamond substrates using microwave plasma assisted chemical vapor deposition. A modification in surface morphology of the film with increasing boron concentration in the plasma has been observed using atomic force microscopy. Use of nitrogen during boron doping has been found to improve the surface morphology and the growth rate of films but it lowers the electrical conductivity of the film. The Raman spectra indicated a zone center optical phonon mode along with a few additional bands at the lower wavenumber regions. The change in the peak profile of the zone center optical phonon mode and its downshift were observed with the increasing boron content in the film. Furthermore, sharpening and upshift of Raman line was observed in the film that was grown in presence of nitrogen along with diborane in process gas.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Infrared-active phonon modes in single-crystal thorium dioxide and uranium dioxide

The infrared-active phonon modes, in single-crystal samples of thorium dioxide (ThO 2 ) and uranium dioxide (UO 2 ), were investigated using spectroscopic ellipsometry and compared with density functional theory. Both ThO 2 and UO 2 are found to have one infrared-active phonon mode pair [consisting of one transverse optic (TO) and one associated longitudinal optic (LO) mode], which is responsible for the dominant features in the ellipsometric data. Furthermore, at room temperature, our results for the mode pair’s resonant frequencies and broadening parameters are comparable with previous reflectance spectroscopy characterizations and density functional theory predictions. For ThO 2 , our ellipsometry and density function theory results both show that the LO mode broadening parameter is larger than the TO mode broadening. This signifies mode anharmonicity, which can be attributed to the intrinsic phonon–phonon interaction. In addition to the main mode pair, a broad low-amplitude impurity-like vibrational mode pair is detected within the reststrahlen band for both ThO 2 and UO 2 . Elevated temperature measurements were performed for ThO 2 in order to study the mechanisms by which the phonon parameters evolve with increased heat. The observed change in the TO resonant frequency is in excellent agreement with previous density functional calculations, which only consider volume expansion of the crystal lattice. This suggests that the temperature-dependent change in the TO frequency is primarily due to volume expansion. The change in the main mode pair’s broadening parameters is nearly linear within the temperature range of this study, which indicates the intrinsic anharmonic scattering (via cubic anharmonicities) as the main decay mechanism.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗

Differential temperature sensor system and method

A differential temperature sensor system and method of determining a temperature shift of an optical resonator and its surroundings are provided. The differential temperature sensor system includes a light generating device capable of generating a beam having a carrier frequency, a modulator capable of modulating the beam with a sideband frequency, and an optical resonator capable of supporting an ordinary mode and an extraordinary mode. The system includes an ordinary mode-lock setup capable of locking the carrier frequency of the beam to the ordinary mode of the optical resonator and an extraordinary mode-lock setup capable of locking the sideband frequency of the beam to the extraordinary mode of the optical resonator by providing a specific radio frequency to the modulator substantially corresponding to a frequency shift between the ordinary mode and the extraordinary mode of the optical resonator resulting from a temperature change of the optical resonator. A processor precisely calculates the differential temperature based upon the frequency shift between the ordinary mode and extraordinary mode of the optical resonator.

Savchenkov, Anatoliy A.↗

Raman analysis of phonon modes in a short period AlN/GaN superlattice

AlN/GaN-based optoelectronic devices have been the subject of intense research underlying the commercialization of efficient devices. Areas of considerable interest are the study of their lattice dynamics, phonon transport, and electron-phonon interactions specific to the interface of these heterostructures which results in additional optical phonon modes known as interface phonon modes. In this study, the framework of the dielectric continuum model (DCM) has been used to compare and analyze the optical phonon modes obtained from experimental Raman scattering measurements on AlN/GaN short-period superlattices. We have observed the localized E 2 (high) , A 1 (LO) and the E 1 (TO) modes in superlattice measurements at frequencies shifted from their bulk values. To the best of our knowledge, the nanostructures used in these studies are among the smallest yielding useful Raman signatures for the interface modes. In addition, we have also identified an additional spread of interface phonon modes in the TO range resulting from the superlattice periodicity. The Raman signature contribution from the underlying Al x Ga 1-x N ternary has also been observed and analyzed. A temperature calibrationwas done based on Stokes/anti-Stokes ratio of A 1 (LO) using Raman spectroscopy in a broad operating temperature range. As a result, good agreement between the experimental results and theoretically calculated calibration plot predicted using Bose-Einstein statistics was obtained.

42 ENGINEERING↗

Abnormal blocking of a guided mode propagating in a silicon optical waveguide with periodic tunnel coupling

This paper considers abnormal blocking of a guided mode propagating in a silicon optical waveguide with periodic tunnelling inserts. Using an independent two-dimensional analysis by the method of lines (MoL) and direct simulation by the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method, we have identified additional signal blocking bands, unrelated to Bragg conversion to backward guided modes of the parent silicon waveguide. These bands are due to the conversion of the incident wave energy to a leaky quasi-mode of the periodically segmented structure, which subsequently transfers the energy to the ambient medium in the form of radiation modes. A distinctive feature of this phenomenon is resonant coupling of the guided mode of the strip waveguide with its radiation modes, which is due to the weak tunnel coupling with the periodically segmented structure. This structure does not support independent guided propagation, so the energy stored in it is re-emitted to space. The abnormal blocking effect may find application in optical telecommunications elements and in the fabrication of optical sensors. (paper)

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Application of the strongly coupled-mode theory to integrated optical devices

A theory for strongly coupled waveguides is discussed and applied to two- and three-waveguide couplers and optical wavelength filters. This theory makes use of an exact analytical relation governing the coupling coefficients and the overlap integrals. It removes almost all of the constraints imposed by a simpler and approximate coupled-mode theory by Marcatili (1986). It also satisfies the energy conservation and the reciprocity theorem self-consistently. Very good numerical results with the overlap integral as large as 49 percent are shown. The applications to electrooptical modulators, power dividers, power transfer devices, and optical filters are all presented with numerical results.

Chuang, Shun-Lien↗

Learning linear optical circuits with coherent states

We analyze the energy and training data requirements for supervised learning of an M-mode linear optical circuit by minimizing an empirical risk defined solely from the action of the circuit on coherent states. When the linear optical circuit acts non-trivially only on k < M unknown modes (i.e. a linear optical k-junta), we provide an energy-efficient, adaptive algorithm that identifies the junta set and learns the circuit. We compare two schemes for allocating a total energy, E, to the learning algorithm. In the first scheme, each of the T random training coherent states has energy E/T. In the second scheme, a single random MT-mode coherent state with energy E is partitioned into T training coherent states. The latter scheme exhibits a polynomial advantage in training data size sufficient for convergence of the empirical risk to the full risk due to concentration of measure on the $(2MT-1)$-sphere. Specifically, generalization bounds for both schemes are proven, which indicate that for ε-approximation of the full risk by the empirical risk with high probability, $O(E^{2/3}M^{2/3}/\epsilon^{2/3})$ training states are sufficient for the first scheme and $O(E^{1/3}M^{1/3}/\epsilon^{2/3})$ training states are sufficient for the second scheme.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Raman Scattering Study of Lattice Vibrations in the Type-II Superlattice InAs / InAs 1 - x Sb x

The InAs/InAs 1-x Sb x superlattice system distinctly differs from two well-studied superlattice systems GaAs/AlAs and InAs/GaSb in terms of electronic band alignment, common elements at the interface, and phonon spectrum overlapping of the constituents. This fact leads to the unique electronic and vibrational properties of the InAs/InAs 1-x Sb x system when compared to the other two systems. Here in this work, we report a polarized Raman study of the vibrational properties of the InAs/InAs 1-x Sb x superlattices (SLs) as well as selected InAs 1-x Sb x alloys, all grown on GaSb substrates by either MBE or metalorganic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) from both the growth surface and cleaved edge. In the SL, from the (001) backscattering geometry, an InAs-like longitudinal optical (LO) mode is observed as the primary feature, and its intensity is found to increase with increasing Sb composition. From the (110) cleaved-edge backscattering geometry, an InAs-like transverse optical (TO) mode is observed as the main feature in two cross-polarization configurations, but an additional InAs-like “forbidden” LO mode is observed in two parallel-polarization configurations. The InAs 1-x Sb x alloys lattice matched to the substrate ( x Sb ~ 0.09) grown by MBE are also found to exhibit the forbidden LO mode, implying the existence of some unexpected [001] modulation. However, the strained samples (x Sb ~ 0.35) grown by MOCVD are found to behave like a disordered alloy. The primary conclusions are (1) the InAs-like LO or TO mode can be either a confined or quasiconfined mode in the InAs layers of the SL or extended mode of the whole structure depending on the Sb composition. (2) InAs/InAs 1-x Sb x and InAs/GaSb SLs exhibit significantly different behaviors in the cleaved-edge geometry but qualitatively similar in the (001) geometry. (3) The appearance of the forbidden LO-like mode is a universal signature for SLs and bulk systems resulting from the mixing of phonon modes due to structural modulation or symmetry reduction.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗