Browse Physics

This design of atomic quantum memory tells us when a pulse of light has been successfully stored and then proceeds to retrieve it without significantly affecting its polarization. The exquisite operation provides a new capability for quantum information networks.

A proposal for obtaining optical resolution better than the classical limit by means of spatially entangled quantum states of light opens a new frontier in the fields of quantum optical imaging, metrology, and sensing.

Different molecules with nearly identical absorption spectra can be distinguished with the help of shaped laser pulses and adaptive algorithms.

Materials with unusual optical properties may allow the construction of sensors surrounded by a cloaking shell that makes the detectors undetectable.

Dispersive probing of an atomic transition decreases the “dead time” of optical atomic clocks, potentially enabling more stable time reference standards.

Loading cold atoms into a hollow-core optical fiber enables all-optical switching with just several hundred photons.

The observation of squeezed phonons by x-ray diffraction allows researchers to study the interactions between ultrafast lasers and matter in a whole new light.

In the weird world of quantum mechanics, looking at time flowing backwards allows us to look forward to precision measurements.

A proposal for a new type of cloaking device suggests a way to hide both a distant object and the cloak itself.

The blurring effects of diffraction pose an obstacle to transmitting an image with all-optical technology. A method to reduce diffraction that takes advantage of the thermal motion of atoms could prove a way to keep images sharp.

Metamaterials can be designed to rotate light as it passes through them. If the effect is strong enough, it can lead to the material having a negative index of refraction and light bouncing around very differently than expected.

Preparing a harmonic oscillator in a state with a well-defined energy is a tricky business. With the new tools provided by cavity and circuit quantum electrodynamics it is now possible to make these pure quantum states and watch how they evolve in time.

Laser beams made up of millions of sharply defined and coherently locked optical frequencies, called optical frequency combs, may provide a way to implement a powerful quantum computer.

Thick layers of disordered materials, such as milk or snow, scatter light so that very little of it gets through. Theorists say that a properly designed combination of incident light waves would be almost completely transmitted and we now have experimental proof of this remarkable result.