Photonics/Optics

Lasers & Laser Systems

This is your destination for lasers and laser systems multimedia resources, technical briefs, and newest developments. Design engineers will find viable solutions to meet their biggest design challenges.

Stories

Blog: Manufacturing & Prototyping

Answering Your Questions: Laser Radar...Or a CMM with a Laser Scanner?

Should you replace your big coordinate measurement machine with laser radar? Or should you just add a laser scanner with a CMM? A reader asks our expert.

Briefs: Sensors/Data Acquisition

Stretchable Micro-Supercapacitors Self-Power Wearable Devices

A stretchable system can harvest energy from human breathing and motion.

Briefs: Photonics/Optics

Low-Energy Nanolaser Shines in all Directions

Compared to a LED, the omnidirectional laser light is much brighter and better defined.

Articles: Photonics/Optics

Products of Tomorrow

Next-generation solar panels, 3D-printed composites from NASA, and a new way to sterilize medical devices.

Special Reports: Test & Measurement

Optics & Photonics Innovations - January 2021

An ultrafast camera that takes up to one trillion pictures per second...using light alone to levitate objects and propel spacecraft...the groundbreaking optics enabling the world's most powerful...

Products: Electronics & Computers

New on the Market: January 2021

Radar sensors, cameras, RF processing systems, and more.

Q&A: Manufacturing & Prototyping

Q&A: A New Method for 3D Printing of Tiny Gel Structures

See how Dr. Andrei Kolmakov and his team are using low-energy electron beams to 3D-print tiny gel structures in liquids.

Briefs: Photonics/Optics

Method Tests Microscopic Aeronautical Materials

This process breaks the temperature barrier in small-scale materials testing.

Briefs: Photonics/Optics

Fine-Pointing Optical Communication System Using Laser Arrays

This technique for optical data transmission from satellites uses laser arrays to provide fine pointing capability.

Briefs: RF & Microwave Electronics

Cascaded Offset Optical Modulator

This subsystem is used in free-space optical communications and fiber-optic communications.

Articles: Motion Control

2020 Create the Future Design Contest: Automotive/Transportation Category Winner — Low-Noise Laser for Lidar

Compact lasers now offer precise colors.

INSIDER Product: Data Acquisition

New Products

Spectrophotometer for a Microscope CRAIC Technologies (San Dimas, CA) has introduced the 508 PV™ UV-visible-NIR spectrophotometer for your microscope. The 508 Perfect Vision™ is designed to be added to an open photoport of a...

Articles: Sensors/Data Acquisition

Megapixel Photon-Counting Camera Technology

See what kinds of applications are possible when you can literally see light propagating through space.

Special Reports: Manufacturing & Prototyping

Additive Manufacturing - November 2020

AM/3D Printing is fundamentally changing how products are prototyped and produced in aerospace, medical, electronics, and many other fields. To help you keep pace with the latest advances, we present this...

Briefs: Photonics/Optics

Imaging Technology Could Improve Cancer Surgery

Cancer treatment could be dramatically improved by precisely locating the edges of tumors during surgery to remove them.

Briefs: Communications

Continuous and Stable Lasing Achieved From Low-Cost Perovskites at Room Temperature

With low-cost materials called perovskites, stable, continuous lasing is achieved at room temperature for over an hour.

Q&A: Photonics/Optics

Q&A: NanoLED Architecture Overcomes Efficiency Droop

A nanoLED has up to 1,000 times the brightness of conventional submicron-sized LEDs.

Products: Motion Control

New Products

Accelerometers, actuators, hexapods, and more.

Briefs: Photonics/Optics

Laser Spark Distribution and Ignition System

Traditional spark plugs are replaced by an optical pumping source.

Briefs: Imaging

Nanocardboard Aircraft with No Moving Parts

Tiny aircraft that weigh as much as a fruit fly could serve as Martian atmospheric probes.

INSIDER: Imaging

Precision Landing Without a Pilot

For planned robotic and crewed missions to the Moon and Mars, NASA is developing and testing precise landing and hazard-avoidance technologies. A combination of laser sensors, a camera, a high-speed...