Barcodes expand range of high-resolution sensor

Optical barcodes for multimode sensing have potential applications in biomedical diagnostics, environmental monitoring, chemical sensing and more

01-May-2024 - The same geometric quirk that lets visitors murmur messages around the circular dome of the whispering gallery at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London or across St. Louis Union Station’s whispering arch also enables the construction of high-resolution optical sensors. Whispering-gallery-mode (WGM) ...

Ultra-sensitive optical sensor can reduce hydrogen’s risks

AI technology led the way

09-Dec-2022 - In the pursuit of clean and renewable energy, hydrogen plays an important role. But a major challenge facing this transition is that the gas is explosive when mixed with air. For this reason, it is crucial to be able to detect hydrogen leaks as early as possible. Now researchers at Chalmers ...

First all-metamaterial optical gas sensor

03-Sep-2019 - Researchers have developed the first fully-integrated, non-dispersive infrared (NDIR) gas sensor enabled by specially engineered synthetic materials known as metamaterials. The sensor has no moving parts, requires little energy to operate and is among the smallest NDIR sensors ever created. The ...

A faster and more efficient way to process information

15-May-2018 - University of Waterloo chemists have found a much faster and more efficient way to store and process information by expanding the limitations of how the flow of electricity can be used and managed. In a recently released study, the chemists discovered that light can induce magnetization in ...

Tiny chip-based methane spectrometer could help reduce greenhouse gas emissions

30-Oct-2017 - The process of extracting natural gas from the earth or transporting it through pipelines can release methane into the atmosphere. Methane, the primary component of natural gas, is a greenhouse gas with a warming potential approximately 25 times larger than carbon dioxide, making it very ...

Organic photodiodes – more economical detectors for the NIR region

07-Sep-2017 - The Fraunhofer Institute for Organic Electronics, Electron Beam and Plasma Technology FEP will be introducing a new generation of organic photodiodes on silicon substrates (OPD-on-silicon) during the SEMI European Imaging & Sensors Summit 2017. Optical sensors are pervasive. Domestic life as well ...

New technology taps power of diatoms to dramatically improve sensor performance

11-Nov-2016 - Researchers at Oregon State University have combined one of nature's tiny miracles, the diatom, with a version of inkjet printing and optical sensing to create an exceptional sensing device that may be up to 10 million times more sensitive than some other commonly used approaches. A patent has ...

Ringing in a new way to measure and modulate trapped light

24-Dec-2015 - Researchers working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a novel way to noninvasively measure and map how and where trapped light vibrates within microscale optical resonators. The new technique not only makes for more accurate measurements but also allows ...

How to spawn an 'exceptional ring'

11-Sep-2015 - The Dirac cone started as a concept in particle and high-energy physics and has recently became important in research in condensed matter physics and material science. It has since been found to describe aspects of graphene, a two dimensional form of carbon, suggesting the possibility of ...

Switching superconductivity by light

16-Feb-2015 - A research team led by Prof. Hiroshi M. Yamamoto of the Institute for Molecular Science, National Institutes of Natural Sciences has developed a novel superconducting transistor which can be switched reversibly between ON and OFF by light-irradiation. This achievement is a milestone for future ...