China News Service, Shanghai, November 3 (Reporter Zheng Yingying) The development of human science and technology today is inseparable from the continuous progress of laser technology.
On November 3, Beijing time, the journal Nature published a research team from the State Key Laboratory of High-Field Laser Physics, Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (abbreviation: Shanghai Institute of Optics and Mechanics) on the research on miniaturized free electron coherent light sources. A breakthrough in the field, which is of great significance to the development of miniaturized or integrated coherent light sources.
Photo courtesy of Shanghai Institute of Optics and Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
"Just like we row a dragon boat, if these 'electronic' athletes on the dragon boat are rowing in different directions and out of step with each other, then the whole dragon boat will not have very good forward momentum. We found a way to make the electronic 'athletes' resonate synchronously way." said Tian Ye, a researcher at the Shanghai Institute of Optics and Mechanics.
Photo courtesy of Shanghai Institute of Optics and Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, the young backbone of the research team
The free electron light source has the outstanding advantages of continuously adjustable wavelength, excellent spatiotemporal characteristics and high brightness.
At present, with the development of semiconductor integrated circuits, the realization of miniaturization of free electron radiation sources has become an international hotspot in this field.
Combining the existing research foundation, the Shanghai Institute of Optics and Mechanics team experimentally studied the dynamics of the "surface plasmon polaritons" pumped by ultrashort electron pulses driven by femtosecond lasers (that is, the dynamics of "electronic dragon boats"). process).
The research results are of great significance for the development of integrated high-power free electron coherent light sources, and also have important application value in application fields such as spectral detection, sensing, and information processing.
Common laser devices, such as ruby lasers, generally need to rely on gain media such as optical crystals to achieve laser output.
The light source based on free electron radiation can be freed from the constraints of crystals or other gain media, and can not only generate free space optical radiation, but also form a type of light source bound to the optical field mode of the waveguide surface on the surface of the waveguide.
In the future, the research team will advance the development of integrated free electron coherent light sources to optimize the brightness of radiated photons and expand the band coverage.
"We are currently designing a small on-chip waveguide to form a high-power light source, and then plan to try some applications." Tian Ye said.
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