Laser Driven Particle Accelerators – Current particle accelerators cost hundreds of millions of dollars and occupy entire buildings. Might it be possible to combine today's laser technology with nano-manufacturing techniques to fabricate a particle accelerator on a chip? That's the possibility being explored at Stanford University, and in this tutorial overview, they’ll explain the concept and its impressive potential applications.

Advances in Cytometry – Cytometry, an optical technique to analyze blood, has been around since the 1940s. Now, a professor from Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, working with colleagues from CalTech and Cornell, is bringing cytometry into the twenty-first century. By combining laser technology and optofluidics, they’ll increase the sensitivity by orders of magnitude, while dramatically reducing the price. Extremely early detection of cancer, and ultimately perhaps even containment of the disease, are among the rewards they see at the end of their search.

Solar Photonics Series – In our continuing series on Solar Photonics, Senior Editor Anne L. Fisher looks at this emerging market.

Thermal Solar – Concentrated photovoltaics is generating much-needed power in large installations. In this article, Brightsource Energy provides an overview on thermal solar and describes large-scale installations.

Popcorn-style Solar Cells – By using a popcorn-ball design—tiny kernels clumped into much larger porous spheres—researchers at the University of Washington are able to manipulate light and more than double the efficiency of converting solar energy to electricity. A lead researcher writes about this breakthrough in dye-sensitized solar cells. The researchers focused on developing new approaches and compared the performance of a homogeneous rough surface with a clumping design.

We will announce additional articles in this series as they become available.

Laser Safety – Commercial lasers come in cases that ensure the beam emerges only from designated apertures, and interlocked doors and warning signs protect laser labs themselves. Between these two levels of laser safety is the enclosure, a box constructed around the laser(s) and all other components on the optical bench. It’s one of the best tools for providing laser safety, says Ken Barat, Laser Safety Officer at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory.

NASA’s Laser Based Missions – Lasers are the tool of choice for many of NASA's Earth-monitoring and space exploring missions due to their accuracy and reliability in measuring distances and environmental parameters. In this overview, experts from NASA Langley discuss the four current laser-based missions, as well as those planned over the next decade.

LED Update – This series coordinated by Senior Editor Anne L. Fisher will provide an update on advances in LED technology.

Color Quality and Spectra of Solid-State Lighting Sources – Experts from National Institute of Standards & Technology will explore color quality including white light chromaticity and color rendering performance, as well as luminous efficacy of radiation, for illumination sources. Also discussed are spectral design considerations for white LED and solid-state lighting products to achieve high color quality as well as high-energy efficiency.

In-Situ LED Junction Temperature Measurement – LED manufacturers and solid-state lighting developers are driving higher power levels. As more energy is pushed through the LED diode junction, heat removal becomes a critical issue. To assure device lifetime, quantum efficiency, and LED color, the diode junction temperature must be maintained within a specified band. In this article, Agilent Technologies discusses a technique that measures diode junction temperature indirectly using the LED diode junction’s inherent voltage/temperature dependency.

Meeting Thermal Challenges – The challenges for the LED market are keeping the color constant, reducing initial capital and ownership costs for LED lighting solutions and improving the efficacy of LED lighting solutions. Many of these challenges can be addressed through better thermal management because of the effect of heat on die lifetime, light output, and color consistency, and should be a key design consideration for LED applications. Experts from Bergquist Company will look at advances in thermal management solutions that can help manage the heat in LED applications, as well as increase the power input and light output in a given lighting footprint, or to increase the power and light density.

Showcase Themes: 

• Microscopy

• Photonics for Semiconductors