Sensores

Focuslight Technologies, a provider of high-power diode lasers and materials, has renamed its subsidiary Focuslight Singapore to Heptagon Photonics to strengthen its branding alignment. Focuslight Singapore, established following last year’s acquisition of optical component assets from ams OSRAM AG, oversees operations in Southeast Asia as part of Focuslight global operations system. Specializing in high-volume manufacturing and rapid production cycles, it serves as a global photonics foundry, providing advanced photonics process development and manufacturing services under the prominent Heptagon brand.

AACHEN, Germany — Black Semiconductor, a developer of graphene-based chip technology, has moved its headquarters to...

Optically pumped magnetometers (OPMs) are used to measure magnetic fields in biosensing, contraband testing, and magnetic communications. They also aid in dark matter searches and serve as promising platforms for quantum-enhanced measurements.

Accurate vector magnetometry, however, remains a challenge for OPMs due to the OPM’s inherent scalar operation. Scalar OPMs require an external reference to extract directional information. While scalar measurements are often sufficient, robust calibration of vector OPMs is increasingly important for applications requiring high accuracy as well as precision.
Artist’s depiction of a new strategy for measuring the direction of magnetic fields by exposing a cell containing roughly...

Superradiance, an optical phenomenon that occurs when quantum systems collectively emit light in a coordinated manner, enhances brightness and increases the speed of emission. Although superradiance has been extensively studied in atomic systems, it is rarely used in solid-state and molecular systems.

A multidisciplinary team from Rice University and Texas A&M University aims to leverage superradiance to improve spatial resolution and achieve high-throughput in single-molecule tracking (SMT) and superresolution imaging (SRI). These advancements could aid research in multiple areas, from materials science to nanotechnology.

“We aim to translate this quantum property into a powerful tool for imaging with potential...

The European Commission has invested €3 million ($3.1 million) to develop a quantum chip that combines electronics and light using germanium-silicon (GeSi) technology. The goal of the project is to make quantum computers faster, more efficient and scalable, allowing them to tackle challenges like drug discovery, cybersecurity, and artificial intelligence.

Supported by the Quantum Flagship, the ONCHIPS consortium unites leading institutions from across Europe to drive technological independence and quantum innovation.

Just as the first computers of the 1950s were impractical and unsuitable for widespread adoption due to their enormous size and limited processing power, today’s quantum computers have their own...

ZuriQ, a spinout of ETH Zurich developing trapped ion quantum computing, has raised $4.2 million to commercialize its proprietary architecture that addresses issues of scaling. The seed funding round was led by Founderful with participation from SquareOne, First Momentum Ventures, OnSight Ventures, and QAI Ventures.
(From left) ZuriQ founders Shreyans Jain, Tobias Saegesser, and Pavel Hrmo. Courtesy of Daniel Kunz.
ZuriQ’s technology changes how ions are trapped, moving from purely electric fields to a combination of electric and magnetic fields. This allows ions to move in all spatial directions like an airplane, while competitor ions move more like cars driving along roads and through junctions. As the number of ions grows,...

Blackbird Robotics has appointed Rüdiger Brockmann as the company’s CEO, taking over for Karl Christian Messer who has held the position since 2017. Brockmann has over 30 years of experience in the industry and laser sector, having held various top management positions in large groups as well as mid-sized companies.

Rüdiger Brockmann (left) and Karl Christian Messer. Courtesy of Blackbird Robotics. SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Optical interconnect technology platform Celestial AI has added Lip-Bu Tan to its board of directors. With more than 40 years of deep-tech expertise as well as extensive board experience, Tan is the founder and chairman of Walden International, a global venture capital firm, as well as a founding...

Prophesee, a developer of neuromorphic vision systems, and Eoptic, an advanced imaging and optics systems integration specialist, have launched a collaboration aimed at integrating high-speed event detection into Eoptic’s prismatic sensor module. The partnership combines Eoptic’s Cambrian Edge imaging platform and Prophesee’s event-based Metavision sensors to provide solutions with low-latency processing, high-speed object tracking, and energy-efficient visual analytics. Through the joint effort, the companies are targeting critical industries including defense, industrial automation, robotics, and autonomous systems.

Prophesee’s event-based Metavision sensors, integrated into the Cambrian M-Series, enable...

Omnitron Sensors, a developer of MEMS-based sensor technologies, has secured over $13 million in Series A funding. The investment will help the company to expand its engineering and operations teams and accelerate the mass production of the company’s first product, a MEMS step-scanning mirror for multiple markets.
Omnitron Sensors co-founder and CEO Eric Aguilar. Courtesy of Omnitron Sensors. According to Omnitron, its technology enables optical cross-connects in AI data centers, optical subsystems in long-range lidar for autonomous navigation, see-through displays in extended reality headsets and eyewear, and precision laser spectrometry for methane gas detection. The company said that its fabrication intellectual property...

A robust, scalable method to introduce chirality into the band structure of semiconductors could advance photonic technologies that rely on controlling light polarization, like displays, sensors, and optical communications, by giving scientists simultaneous control over light, spin, and charge.

Chiral materials are often created through exciton-coupling, a process where light excites nanomaterials to form excitons that interact and share energy with each other. Historically, exciton-coupled chiral materials were made from organic molecules. Creating chiral materials from inorganic semiconductors has proven challenging due to the precise control needed over nanomaterial interactions.

Researchers from Cornell University,...

Lumentum Holdings has named Michael Hurlston president, CEO, and a director of the company, effective Feb. 7. Hurlston succeeds Alan Lowe, who has served as the company’s president and CEO since 2015. Lowe will continue as a member of Lumentum’s board of directors and will serve as an advisor to the company.

Hurlston joins Lumentum from Synaptics, where he served as president and CEO and a member of the board of directors since joining the company in 2019. Prior to Synaptics, Hurlston served as CEO and a member of the board of Finisar Corporation, which was a leading optical communications company acquired by Coherent (previously II-VI) in 2019. He also served in a variety of management roles at Broadcom and its...

It is unlikely that anyone who has read the Z136.1: Safe Use of Lasers Standard, or any of the application standards stemming from it, is unfamiliar with standard operating procedure (SOP). By definition, SOP is a formal written description of the safety and administrative procedures to be followed in performing a specific task. In laser safety, SOP typically applies to the laser system operation and alignment.

Unlike the fluorescent bulb, for example, SOP has not evolved over the years even as it is foundational to laser safety. And while it may be logical that the essence of SOP be unchanged, there are nuances to consider, as is true of other laser safety procedural elements. Knowing when an SOP is required is critical to...

Polymer refractive microlenses are the core technology in many micro-optical modules, which themselves are critical enabling technologies for an expanse of optoelectronic systems, including those found in cars, smartphones, and wearables. Microlenses in ambient light sensors, diffractive optical elements for structured light generation, and high-precision surface relief gratings in diffractive waveguides — which enable emerging technologies such as 3D sensing and augmented reality glasses — are just some of the functionalities that these refractive optics enable. In the automotive sector specifically, this class of micro-optical modules is used in ultracompact microlens-enabled projector beam headlights and other lighting...

The 50th iteration of the Optical Fiber Communication Conference and Exhibition (OFC) will take place this year at San Fransisco’s Moscone Center, moving north from its longtime residence in San Diego. From March 30 to April 3, the conference is expected to host more than 13,500 participants from more than 80 countries while featuring more than 600 exhibiting global companies.

The live event’s multitude of highlights and displays will revolve around three exhibition hall theaters, showcasing expert presentations on hot topics such as market watches and data center hyperscaling. As a hallmark of OFC, showcases will place an additional focus on how the latest technology innovations are being used at the conference itself.
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Celestial navigation is a dying art in our world. Sure, summer camp counselors might instruct their younger adventurers that they can locate north by correctly identifying the North Star, Polaris, while on a nighttime hike in the woods. But let’s be honest — no kid forcibly enrolled in this excursion is willingly taking woodland strolls at night for fear of a rogue bear or an encounter with something more supernatural that could be hiding in the shadows.

The stars used to be the primary source of navigation. From sailing to the New World to traveling across great swaths of indistinguishable terrain, if an intrepid adventurer, merchant, or refugee found themselves off track or misdirected with a map, they could always count...

Semiconductor technology company VueReal has secured $40.5 million in Series C funding. The funding will allow the company to scale its production capabilities and expand its global ecosystem to support the integration of micro-LEDs into commercial production.

VueReal’s MicroSolid Printing technology supports cost-effective high-volume micro-LED by efficiently transferring LEDs from wafer to backplane. The technology targets consumer electronics, automotive, and healthcare industries. The method supports the production of micro-LED displays and other micro semiconductor devices.

Last year, VueReal made plans to double its manufacturing space and established partnerships with RiTdisplay and Toray Engineering. Additional...

Microlenses, micrometer-sized lenses that capture and focus light into intense beams at a microscopic scale, typically require complex, expensive machinery and extreme temperatures or pressures to produce. A bioinspired approach to making microlenses, based on the enzymes secreted by sea sponges, could offer a way to create inexpensive, durable, advanced microlenses for use in medicine, biology, and materials science.

Sea sponges grow glass skeletons made of silica (also called bioglass). This silica skeleton is both lightweight and resilient, allowing the sea sponge to withstand harsh marine environments.
Graduate student Lynn Sidor prepares bacteria cells that will self-assemble their own glass coating by using enzymes from sea...

For decades, end users and systems designers have valued radar technology for its reliability. Especially in adverse weather conditions in which sensors based on other modalities are apt to fail, radar is a dependable technique offering broad application potential.

As a result of this robustness and widespread applicability, radar today is established as a standard sensing system in several high-growth technology sectors. The automotive industry, for example, has been a key driver of radar sensor miniaturization and overall performance improvements. The commercialization of radar for passenger vehicles predates the turn of the century, and radar sensors are also now commonly deployed in advanced driver-assistance systems, including...

Last spring, electronics giant Toshiba announced its plans to ship its first test sample hard disk drives (HDDs) using heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) technology. Toshiba, at the time of the announcement, said that it is targeting 2025 for the shipment.


Courtesy of iStock.com/Remitski.
The decision as well as the technological advancement represent an emerging movement in the data storage and photonics industries. Toshiba’s debut of its HAMR HDDs, with 28 to 30 Tb of storage, follows Seagate Technology’s rollout of similar technology in 2017, following 15 years of research.

With Toshiba and Seagate expecting to be working toward mass-producing HAMR HDDs with 32 Tb of storage capacity by next year,...

The remarkable capabilities of human vision serve as a powerful inspiration to developers of advanced optical systems. Despite its seemingly uncomplicated design, comprising a single lens and offering about ~1 MP of resolution per eye, human vision achieves exceptional performance. For this reason, designers and engineers strive to replicate and even surpass its capabilities.


Courtesy of iStock.com/tein-studio.
Yet while the capabilities of human vision provide a dynamic reference, creating vision systems that deliver high magnification, small pixel sizes, and low f-numbers — especially in low-light conditions — poses substantial challenges. These factors tend to reduce the depth of field, necessitating precise...

Optical fibers are well known and widely used as the transmission medium for optical communications. Due to the rapid increase of technology and service demand that has characterized modern optical data and telecommunications, optical fibers are necessary to use as optical amplifiers for long-haul transmission.

The most suitable example of this evolution was the development of the erbium-doped fiber amplifier. This device consists of a laser-active gain medium that enables the amplification of optical signals of 1.55 µm. Similarly, ytterbium-doped fibers (YDFs) are now an established solution supporting the growth of manufacturing and materials processing, owing to their suitability for high-power generation with a superior beam...