The University of Southampton

Nanyang Technological University

Other

Nikolay Ivanovich Zheludev

David John Richardson

Edward Thomas Foss Rogers

Nikitas Papasimakis

Jun-Yu Ou

Guanghui Yuan

Boris I Kokorin

Jari Juhani Lindberg

William James Stewart

Eric Plum

Sergei Kurdiumov

Tapashree Roy

Jianfa Zhang

Carolina Rendón-Barraza

Salatore Savo

Vassily Savinov

Tanchao Pu

Kevin Francis MacDonald

Eng Aik Chan

Vassili Savinov

Vassili A Fedotov

Sukhminder Dhanjal

John E Chad

Anagnostis Tsiatmas

Mark Richard Dennis

Francisco Javier Garcia De Abajo

A method of imaging comprises: generating a superoscillatory field from coherent electromagnetic radiation; placing an object in the superoscillatory field; detecting one or more intensity distributions of the superoscillatory field scattered by the object; and determining at least one characteristic of the object from the one or more intensity distributions.

Method and apparatus for super-resolution optical imaging

An optical method of characterizing an object comprises providing an object to be characterized, the object having at least one nanoscale feature; illuminating the object with coherent plane wave optical radiation having a wavelength larger than the nanoscale feature; capturing a diffraction intensity pattern of the radiation which is scattered by the object; supplying the diffraction intensity pattern to a neural network trained with a training set of diffraction intensity patterns corresponding to other objects with a same nanoscale feature as the object to be characterized, the neural network configured to recover information about the object from the diffraction intensity pattern; and making a characterization of the object based on the recovered information.

Method and apparatus for characterizing an object

A method of determining a displacement comprises: generating an interferometric superoscillatory field from coherent electromagnetic radiation, the interferometric superoscillatory field comprising an interference pattern between a reference field and a superoscillatory field; detecting with a detector a first set of intensity distributions of the interferometric superoscillatory field, each intensity distribution from a different polarisation state of the electromagnetic radiation; detecting with the detector a second set of intensity distributions of the interferometric superoscillatory field, each intensity distribution from the same polarisation states of the electromagnetic radiation as the first set of intensity distributions; extracting a first local wavevector distribution from the first set of intensity distributions and a second local wavevector distribution from the second set of intensity distributions; comparing the first local wavevector distribution and the second local wavevector distribution to identify any change in position of one or more features in the local wavevector distributions; and ascertaining that a lateral displacement has occurred between the interferometric superoscillatory field and the detector if a change in position is identified.

Method and apparatus for super-resolution optical metrology

A super-oscillatory lens () having a pre-defined pattern to spatially modulate the light beam in amplitude and/or phase which has a blocking element () formed integrally with the lens, or as a separate component adjacent to the lens, which is opaque to the light beam to cause diffraction of the light beam around the blocking element and formation of a shadow region (). The lens and blocking element focus the light beam to form an elongate needle-shaped focus () in the shadow region (). In any application in which it is necessary to scan a small spot over a surface, compared with a conventional objective lens focus the elongate shape of the focus relaxes the requirement on a feedback loop to maintain a constant separation between a scan head and a surface being scanned. The elongate shape is also ideal shape for materials processing applications.

Super-oscillatory lens device

First and second coherent light beams of the same wavelength are propagated in opposite directions to interact on a sub-wavelength thickness metallic metamaterial layer which is structured with a periodicity such that there is a resonance matched to the wavelength of the coherent beams. The first beam is then able to modulate the intensity of the second beam by modulating the phase and/or intensity of the first beam. The interference of the counter- propagating beams can eliminate or substantially reduce Joule loss of light energy in the metamaterial layer or, on the contrary, can lead to a near total absorption of light, depending on the mutual phase and/or intensity of the interacting beams. A modulation is thus provided without using a non-linear effect.

Optical devices, systems and methods

An imaging apparatus is disclosed which uses a super-oscillatory lens to obtain sub-diffraction limit resolution. The super-oscillatory lens is arranged to receive a light beam from a light source, the lens having a pre-defined pattern to spatially modulate the light beam in amplitude and/or phase so that it focuses the light beam to a focus at a first focal point having a full width half maximum of less than half the wavelength. Collection optical elements are arranged to focus the first focal point to a second focal point conjugate to the first focal point. An object for imaging is scanned over the first focal point and a detector is arranged to collect light from a collection region centered on the second focal point.

Super-oscillatory lens apparatus and methods

A metallic ring is made of two metals, wherein one metal forms a major arcuate portion and the other a minor arcuate portion of the ring, thereby forming a thermocouple-type structure as a result of the two inter-metallic junctions. The metallic ring supports a surface plasmon whose energy is matched to the energy, i.e. wavelength, of an incident light beam so that the oscillating electromagnetic field of the light resonates with the plasmon. The resonating plasmon causes a temperature difference to arise between the two inter-metallic junctions in the ring. The different Seebeck coefficients of the two metals results in the temperature difference causing a net current to flow around the ring, which in turn generates a magnetic field. Such a thermoelectric metamaterial ring transforms high frequency optical energy into long duration magnetic radiation pulses in the terahertz range. Applications of these devices include high density magnetic recording, magnetic field spectroscopy, and efficient terahertz radiation sources.

Magnetic field generator

A tunable metamaterial comprising a membrane on which is arranged a two-dimensional array of elements to form a metamaterial, wherein the array is subdivided into blocks of multiple elements, each block being separated from adjacent blocks by a gap to allow each block to be moveable relative to its adjacent blocks. The lattice of the metamaterial and hence its properties are tuned by inducing adjacent blocks to move away from each other or towards each other either in-plane or out-of-plane in a controllable manner in response to an electrical, thermal or optical control signal.

Tunable metamaterials and related devices

An antenna for transmitting information by means of electromagnetic fields in free space is formed as a supertoroidal conductor, comprising a helical coil of wire with the coil itself being wound helically around a toroidal former to form a toroidally shaped coiled coil. Higher orders of supertoroid are formed by replacing the wire of the above first order supertoroidal conductor with a helical coil. The supertoroidal antenna is energized from a signal generator generating signals including frequencies not less than 2 c/l, where l is the length of conductor in the supertoroidal antenna. Both transmitting and receiving arrangements are disclosed.

Transmitting and receiving apparatus

An optically responsive variable reflecting surface uses a body of gallium held at a temperature slightly below its bulk melting point. Irradiation of the surface with optical energy produces substantial changes in surface reflectance. Devices employing gallium may be used for switching optical waveguides and in control of lasers.

Growing community of inventors

Southampton, United Kingdom

Nikolay Ivanovich Zheludev