Laser Focus World articles from August 2007

Laser Focus World archives from August 2007

Fiber lasers abound.(editor's desk)
August 1, 2007... In June an enormous and potentially overwhelming number of new products were introduced at Laser 2007 in Munich, Germany. Many of them will be covered in upcoming issues of Laser Focus World. In the meantime, you can find an overview of the...

MIXSELs: a new class of laser makes the scene.(newsbreaks)
August 1, 2007... Researchers at ETH Zurich (Zurich, Switzerland) announced the first successful demonstration of a novel type of ultrafast laser. The passively modelocked vertical-external-cavity surface-emitting semiconductor laser (MIXSEL) has potential as a...

Fabrication technique may lead to commercial electrowetting displays.(newsbreaks)
August 1, 2007... One very different entry in the race to create a commercially viable flexible display is the electrowetting display, in which each pixel contains a drop of colored oil that is moved electrically to different locations within the pixel cell....

Holographic target measures astigmatism.(newsbreaks)
August 1, 2007... Building on previous research that used a hologram to measure spherical aberration of the human eye, researchers in the School of Optometry and Vision Science at the University of New South Wales (New South Wales, Australia), have developed a...

Iodine for COIL is generated chemically.(newsbreaks)
August 1, 2007... One very capable prospect for a compact, ultra-high-power laser source for military and other uses is the chemical oxygen-iodine laser (COIL; see www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/277162), which emits at 1.3 [micro]m. A conventional COIL gets...

Wire-grid polarizing structure improves stereoscopic 3-D display.(newsbreaks)
August 1, 2007... Conventional stereoscopic displays have a three-dimensional (3-D) panel consisting of a glass substrate on which horizontal strips of half- or quarter-wave retarders alternate with strips of transparent glass that are attached to the...

Circularly polarized pulses enable ultrafast magnetic recording.(newsbreaks)
August 1, 2007... A way to magnetize recordable media without using magnets has been developed by researchers at Radboud University Nijmegen (Nijmegen, The Netherlands) and Nihon University (Chiba, Japan). Instead of magnets, the approach relies on the magnetic...

Thulium-doped crystal achieves tunable lasing in near-IR.(newsbreaks)
August 1, 2007... Diode-pumped solid-state lasers emitting in the near-IR provide an attractive range of applications such as optical-frequency stabilization, pumping of indium gallium arsenide laser diodes, and molecular spectroscopy of chemical compounds...

LG.Philips LCD and UDC develop first a-Si flexible AMOLED display.(newsbreaks)
August 1, 2007... Engineers at LG.Philips LCD (Seoul, Korea), a developer of thin-film-transistor liquid-crystal-display (TFT-LCD) technology, have created the first full-color flexible active-matrix organic-light-emitting-diode (AMOLED) display that uses...

Adding quantum dots to microdisks makes silicon-based light emitters.(newsbreaks)
August 1, 2007... Silicon (Si)-based light-emitting devices are ideal for use in optoelectronic-integrated-circuit applications because of their low cost, high reliability, and functional versatility. Now, researchers at Musashi Institute of Technology (Tokyo,...

Plasma filaments produce terahertz radiation.(ULTRAFAST LASERS)
August 1, 2007... With an increasing number of terahertz-radiation schemes being developed, nothing could be more satisfying to a terahertz researcher than the creation of a new type of terahertz source from an existing photonics technology. French researchers...

Low-cost touch screen relies on optical waveguides.(world news: optoelectronics)
August 1, 2007... An inexpensive optical touch-screen technology developed at RPO (Acton, Australia) and dubbed Digital Waveguide Touch is intended for applications in low-cost mobile devices, as well as for higher-cost professional touch-screen applications....

Laser 2007: of green apples and fiber lasers.(WORLD OF PHOTONICS)
August 1, 2007... Mention Munich to most people and it probably conjures up thoughts of the Oktoberfest and beer. But for those who attended Laser 2007 in June, Munich is (for the moment anyway) more likely to bring to mind green apples and fiber lasers. Show...

In situ monitoring chases automotive emissions.(SPECTROMETERS)
August 1, 2007... Researchers at the University of Manchester (England) have developed a multi-species near-infrared (NIR) diode-laser spectrometer for in situ measurements of carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and methane in the exhaust of internal-combustion...

ARROW-based lab on a chip sees one bioparticle at a time.(OPTOFLUIDICS)
August 1, 2007... Researchers at the University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC) have created fluid-filled antiresonant reflecting optical waveguides (ARROWs) on a silicon chip to form a tool that, using fluorescence-correlation spectroscopy (FCS), can detect the...

Undulators for x-ray FEL pass key milestone.(FREE-ELECTRON LASERS)
August 1, 2007... The idea of a free-electron laser (FEL) that produces beams in the x-ray wavelength range has long intrigued researchers, particularly in the biomedical and materials-processing sectors. Three groups are currently developing x-ray FELs, one at...

Novel architecture to enable cheap holo-video display.(HOLOGRAPHIC VIDEO)
August 1, 2007... While researchers around the globe have invested time and energy on holographic displays for years, the resulting tabletop setups have been too bulky and expensive to be practical for commercial applications. The MIT Media Laboratory...

Multicolor uncooled diode array efficiently pumps Nd:YAG laser.(LASER-DIODE ARRAYS)
August 1, 2007... Flashlamp pumping of Nd:YAG-based solid-state lasers is rapidly being replaced by laser-diode pumping. Although diodes can be matched to the gain medium and require less-elaborate cooling systems, the operating wavelength of laser diodes...

Little laser spectrometer has applications galore.(SPECTROMETRY)
August 1, 2007... A miniature sub-Doppler-laser spectrometer developed at NIST (Boulder, CO; see www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/294625), measuring only 1 [cm.sup.3] and operable at multiple wavelengths between 780 and 1590 nm, is practical for numerous...

Europeans HiPER about laser fusion.(INERTIAL FUSION)
August 1, 2007... A European program called HiPER (high-power laser-energy-research facility) aims to develop laser-fusion technology to a point where it is commercially attractive for powerplant use. In the program, researchers will develop the "fast ignition"...

Tunable nanoscopic lasers probe cellular domains.(NANOIMAGING)
August 1, 2007... Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL; Berkeley, CA) and the University of California at Berkeley have invented a bio-friendly nanosize electrode-free light source capable of emitting coherent light that can be continuously...

Metal films may enable revolutionary lunar liquid telescope.(LIQUID MIRRORS)
August 1, 2007... Although a telescope on the moon would give astronomers the immense benefit of the pure seeing conditions of a vacuum, getting a telescope there is a massive, expensive undertaking. For the first time, researchers have announced the successful...

Submissions sought for Berthold Leibinger award.(industry report: laser)
August 1, 2007... Applications and proposals are now being accepted for the 2008 Berthold Leibinger Innovationpreis. The international award is intended to recognize innovations that involve the use or generation of laser light. Individuals and project teams who...

Entrepreneur award goes to Cascade.(industry report: laser)
August 1, 2007... Cascade Technologies (Stifling, Scotland) won the Science and Technology Entrepreneur of the Year title at the Ernst & Young Scotland Entrepreneur of the Year Awards 2007. Cascade Technologies, created in 2003, has developed and patented gas-,...

Philips to acquire Color Kinetics.(industry report: laser)
August 1, 2007... Color Kinetics (Boston, MA), a manufacturer of light-emitting-diode (LED) lighting systems and technologies, entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by Royal Philips Electronics (Amsterdam, The Netherlands). Philips will pay $34 per...

Welsh group pursues cinema laser displays.(industry report: laser)
August 1, 2007... Scientists at Swansea University (Swansea, Wales) are developing new laser display technologies that they say will enhance the quality of cinema projections and may lead to revenues in excess of $2 billion a year. The project is led by Bookham...

CeeLite and Eastman ink LEC agreement.(industry report: laser)
August 1, 2007... Eastman Chemical Company and CeeLite (both in Kingsport, TN) have signed an agreement to manufacture CeeLite light-emitting-capacitor (LEC) panels using Eastman's patented Encapsulation Technology and Spectar copolyester. Using electrodes to...

Aculight (Bothell, WA) was awarded a subcontract from The Pennsylvania State University Electro-Optic Center (EOC: Freeport. PA).(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Aculight Bothell, WA) was awarded a subcontract from The Pennsylvania State University Electro-Optic Center (EOC: Freeport. PA) for $2.6 million to develop mid-infrared laser transmitters for use in aircraft-missile counter-measure defense...

Dilas.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Dilas (Mainz, Germany) unveiled a new brand identity to reinforce its image and market growth over the past years with a bold and modern font and a new tagline. "The diode laser company".

Quanlight.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Quanlight (San Diego, CA), a startup that intends to commercialize a new material system for red light-emitting diodes, raised $3 million in its Series B offering.

Royal Phillips Electronics completed its acquisition of TIR Systems (Vancouver, BC, Canada), a provider of solid-state lighting technology.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Royal Phillips Electronics completed its acquisition of TIR Systems (Vancouver, BC, Canada), a provider of solid-state lighting technology for products that generate high-quality white light.

The Trumpf Group (Ditzingen, Germany) and Jenoptik (Jena, Germany) set up a joint venture called JT Optical Engine.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... The Trumpf Group (Ditzingen. Germany) and Jenoptik (Jena, Germany) set up a joint venture called JT Optical Engine that will develop, produce and sell optical modules known as optical engines' for fiber lasers.

LED modular-video-panel maker Lighthouse Technologies (Hong Kong, China) added a dedicated Japanese section.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... LED modular-video-panel maker Lighthouse Technologies (Hong Kong, China) added a dedicated Japanese section on its Web site at www.lighthouse-tech.com.

Powerlase (Crawley England) announced the placement of a laser with Fraunhofer ISE (Freiburg, Germany).(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Powerlase (Crawley England) announced the placement of a laser with Fraunhofer ISE (Freiburg, Germany) for programs relating to the processing of solar cells.

BAE Systems.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... BAE Systems (Nashua, NH) received two U.S. Army contracts totaling $54 million to provide a multiband laser technology upgrade for the Advanced Threat Infrared Countermeasures/Common Missile Warning System program.

Heptagon expands Singapore facility.(industry report: optics)
August 1, 2007... Heptagon (Rueschlikon, Switzerland), a manufacturer of wafer-scale micro-optics, is establishing a 20,000 sq ft manufacturing facility and regional headquarters in Singapore. This facility, which will be operational in mid-2007, is part of a...

Agilent extends optical-coating capability.(industry report: optics)
August 1, 2007... Optics and optical-coating provider Agilent Technologies (Santa Clara, CA) announced the installation of a reactive magnetron thin-film optical-coating system from Leybold Optics (Alzenau, Germany). The new system will be used for coating...

Abiogen chooses Thermo Scientific system.(industry report: optics)
August 1, 2007... Thermo Fisher Scientific (Madison, WI) announced that Abiogen Pharma (Pisa, Italy), a pharmaceutical manufacturer, chose the Thermo Scientific Antaris Fourier-transform near-infrared (FT-NIR) analytical system to perform raw materials...

LINOS and Lambda partner on software.(industry report: optics)
August 1, 2007... Lambda Research (Littleton, MA), a developer and supplier of optical design software, announced a new distribution partnership with LINOS Photonics (Milford, MA) in which LINOS is the new exclusive distributor of Lambda's TracePro products in...

Optics Express and Optics Letters lead field.(industry report: optics)(Letter to the editor)
August 1, 2007... The Optical Society of America (OSA) announced that based on "impact factor," or the number of citations compared to the number of papers published, its journals Optics Express and Optics Letters are the most heavily cited journals in optics....

SPIE.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... SPIE Bellingham, WA) retired "The International Society for Optical Engineering" as its business name and will simply be known as SPIE.

Technical Manufacturing.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Customer demand for precision floor vibration-isolation systems from Technical Manufacturing (Peabody, MA) fueled its fourth building expansion in 15 years; an additional 9000 sq ft of manufacturing space brings the building to 80,000 sq ft on...

OSA.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... The OSA unveiled a new design and features for its career services Web site, WorkInOptics.com, that make the site easier to use.

The OSA and the American Institute of Physics (College Park, MD) are partnering to develop television news segments on advances in optics and photonics.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... The OSA and the American Institute of Physics (College Park, MD) are partnering to develop television news segments on advances in optics and photonics in a program called "Discoveries and Breakthroughs Inside Science" (segments are on the OSA...

The Carolinas Photonics Consortium (CPC) announced the signing of the CPC Inter-Institutional Agreement.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... The Carolinas Photonics Consortium (CPC) announced the signing of the CPC Inter-Institutional Agreement by North Carolina State University, The University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Western Carolina University, Clemson University, and Duke...

ASU opens Advanced Photovoltaics Center.(industry report: imaging & detector)
August 1, 2007... Arizona State University (ASU; Tempe, AZ) recently established the Advanced Photovoltaics Center (ASU-APC), an initiative supported by state funding and the university administration. The center is directed by Ghassan E. Jabbour, professor in...

Border imaging contract goes to FLIR.(industry report: imaging & detector)
August 1, 2007... FLIR Systems (Portland, OR) was awarded a contract from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) for Ranger III multisensor systems valued at $6 million. The systems will be installed along the southern U.S. border as upgrades to older...

Image-sensor market seeing rapid growth.(industry report: imaging & detector)
August 1, 2007... The image-sensor market reached $6 billion in 2006, a jump of more than 30% over 2005, with sales expected to grow another 14% in 2007, according to a new market report from Strategies Unlimited (Mountain View, CA). While the overall market is...

BPI awarded patent for imaging system.(industry report: imaging & detector)
August 1, 2007... Biomedical Photometrics (BPI; Waterloo, ON, Canada), manufacturer of multifunctional scanning-laser imaging systems that combine patented panoramic fluorescence confocal technology with automated functionality, announced that the U.S. Patent...

Leica Geosystems.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Leica Geosystems (Nocross, GA) supplier of airborne sensors and laser rangefinders for image mapping, plans to open its first ever. "Geomatics Center of Excellence" In Houston. TX, which will serve as a technology showcase and educational...

The U.S. Display Consortium (San Jose, CA) began a two-year, $450,000 Cooperating Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (Gaithersburg, MD).(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... The U.S. Display Consortium (San Jose, CA) began a two-year, $450,000 Cooperating Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (Gaithersburg, MD) to enable the development of tools and...

Oki Electric Industry.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Oki Electric Industry (Tokyo, Japan) increased production at its Thailand plant of large-scale integration driver chips from 10 million to 15 million per month to respond to the rapidly expanding demand for full high-definition...

iSuppli.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... According to market research firm iSuppli (El Segundo, CA), unit shipments for bistable, low-power, and zero-power displays--a set of technologies that spans liquid-crystal, electrophoretic, and electrochromic displays, among others--are...

Infinera finds success with IPO.(industry report: fiber optics)
August 1, 2007... In its initial public offering Infinera (Sunnyvale, CA) raised $182 million, with share prices jumping 52% on the first day of trading. The company's stock, which trades on the Nasdaq exchange under the symbol "INFN," was originally offered at...

RED-C and JDSU expand collaboration.(industry report: fiber optics)
August 1, 2007... JDSU (Milpitas, CA), an enabler of broadband and optical-networking technologies, and RED-C Optical Networks (RED-C; Tel Aviv, Israel), a provider of integrated optical subsystems based on optical-amplification technology, announced a strategic...

OFS invites optical-fiber collaboration.(industry report: fiber optics)
August 1, 2007... Optical fiber manufacturer OFS Specialty Photonics (Avon, CT) is inviting collaborators to develop new applications that are based on two breakthroughs from its laboratories in higher-order-mode (HOM) technology. According to David DiGiovanni,...

Infinera network helps XO win award.(industry report: fiber optics)
August 1, 2007... XO Communications' (Reston, VA) Inter-City Network won an Eos Excellence of Achievement Award for Best Backbone/Core Network. The Eos Awards are awarded by NXTComm, a leading telecom industry trade show, to honor those companies that have...

Sterlite Optical Technologies.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Optical fiber manufacturer Sterlite Optical Technologies (Pune, India) was granted a U.S. patent for invention of its DQF-UTE (LEA) single-mode dispersion-optimized fiber having a higher spot area.

Avago Technologies (San Jose, CA) announced that it has closed its acquisition of Infineon Technologies'.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Avago Technologies (San Jose, CA) announced that it has closed its acquisition of Infineon Technologies' polymer optical-fiber business unit based in Regensburg, Germany.

Consulting firm Frost & Sullivan (San Jose, CA) selected Foundry Networks (Santa Clara, CA) as the recipient of the 2007 Most Valued Product Award.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... Consulting firm Frost & Sullivan (San Jose, CA) selected Foundry Networks (Santa Clara, CA) as the recipient of the 2007 Most Valued Product Award for its highly dense and feature-rich backbone and metro router families.

Infonetics.(Also in the news ...)
August 1, 2007... According to the "Passive Optical Network (PON) and Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) Equipment and Subscribers" report from research firm Infonetics (Campbell, CA), worldwide PON equipment sales sequentially grew 9% in the first quarter of 2007,...

Going 'deep black' for government dollars.(working the web)
August 1, 2007... The phrase "deep black" has long encompassed the stealth mode associated with the technology behind national security and space espionage. Millions of grant and contract dollars ore available for technology that directly impacts...

Why does it take so long to earn a Ph. D.?(business forum)
August 1, 2007... Q: It now takes around six years to get a Ph. D. in optics or photonics. Why so long? A: I spoke with three prominent professors with research programs in three corners of the U.S. All three agreed that the Ph.D. process is getting longer,...

The color treatment: optical filters with a monochrome camera sometimes accomplish the same task as a color camera.(inside imaging)
August 1, 2007... Color-based machine vision has historically required more money and processing power than an equivalent monochrome solution, but recently color-based hardware and image-processing products have become more cost effective. As a result, food...

Photons flow in liquid circuits.(PHOTONIC CRYSTALS)(Cover story)
August 1, 2007... Photonic crystals offer promise as a substrate for all-optical devices that may eventually circumvent the intrinsic miniaturization limits of silicon-based integrated electronic circuits. Photonic-crystal systems are characterized by a periodic...

Thin-film TECs give new life to CMOS cooling.(CMOS DETECTORS)
August 1, 2007... Active cooling is becoming essential for many advanced electronic and optoelectronic devices. Two attributes are important for active cooling of components: the ability to maintain a temperature difference between two surfaces and the ability...

Trapping with light ... fantastic: a new breed of optical tweezers is making it easier to isolate, manipulate, and analyze the behavior of molecules and atoms.(OPTOELECTRONIC APPLICATIONS: OPTICAL TOOLS)
August 1, 2007... First discovered in the 1970s by Arthur Ashkin at Bell Laboratories and further developed by physicists and biologists worldwide in the 1980s and 1990s (many of whom went on to win Nobel Prizes based on their work), optical trapping has become...

Next-generation thermal-IR cameras use shutterless imaging.(NIGHT VISION)
August 1, 2007... Things have come a long way since 1800 when Sir William Herschel first discovered that an invisible form of light existed beyond the visible spectrum--what we have now come to know as infrared. It was, in fact, a purely coincidental...

Fiber lasers prove attractive for industrial applications.(FIBER LASERS)
August 1, 2007... As fiber lasers extend their performance capabilities and penetrate markets that were previously the strongholds of conventional laser technologies, the question now is: what are the limits of fiber-laser applications? Whether the application...

Self-calibrating technique enables long-distance temperature sensing: Raman distributed temperature sensing provides accurate temperature profiles along the entire length of a sensing fiber over distances of more than 15 km.(FIBER-OPTIC SENSING)
August 1, 2007... Optical fibers have been used as a major tool in telecommunications for decades. But recently, the adoption rate of fiber-optic sensors and sensing technologies has grown rapidly because of unique advantages over other measurement devices and...

All-optical: the path to high-speed wavelength conversion: wavelength converters have reached 320 Gbit/s in the laboratory, but much work remains to develop practical devices for future optical networks.(PHOTONIC FRONTIERS: WAVELENGTH CONVERSION)
August 1, 2007... To change the wavelength of a signal, today's wavelength-division-multiplexed networks have to convert optical signals to electronic form to drive a laser transmitter emitting at the desired wavelength. The dramatic success of optical...

Printed photonics require nanoscale measurements.(INSTRUMENTATION FOR NANOPHOTONICS)
August 1, 2007... The fast-growing field of printed photonics enables rapid development and production of lightweight, ultrathin, bendable photonic devices with nanoscale features. This technology demands high material quality, precise material deposition, and...

Digital camera.(new products)
August 1, 2007... The X-EMA highs-peed digital camera for airborne, ballistics, and harsh industrial applications is shockproof up to 100 G/15 ms/3 axes. It has 1.3-megapixel resolution at 500 frames/s and works at up to 32,000 frames/s at reduced resolutions....

Diode-laser bars.(new products)
August 1, 2007... PulseLife Horizontal Arrays are diode-laser packages that come in two-bar or three-bar linear arrays, with respective outputs of 80 and 120 W at 808 nm. They use a macrochannel cooling architecture that allows use of plain, filtered (less than...

Vibration isolation.(new products)
August 1, 2007... A benchtop vibration-isolation system comes with external control electronics for use with applications that are sensitive to temperature and electromagnetic fields. Four connectors on the read side lead to an external control box, which...

Sapphire waveplates.(new products)
August 1, 2007... Custom-made sapphire waveplates are a durable, chemically resistant replacement for single-crystal quartz or mica in the visible and near-IR. They come in half- and quarter-wave configurations for changing the polarization of a beam...

Automated metrology system.(new products)
August 1, 2007... The SDM200 is an automated metrology system for double-sided alignment and exposure applications used in the manufacture of MEMS devices, semiconductors, and optoelectronics. The system uses pattern-recognition technology for an accuracy of 0.2...

Specular reflectance accessories.(new products)
August 1, 2007... New specular reflectance accessories are used with the Evolution 300 and 600 UV-VIS spectrophotometers. They can measure the specular reflectance of mirror-like or glossy surfaces. The VN Abosolute Specular accessory provides absolute,...

Optical-time-domain reflectometer.(new products)
August 1, 2007... The AQ7270 optical-time-domain reflectometer (OTDR) measures optical-fiber lengths and losses and identifies failure locations. The instrument uses a newly developed optical component and is designed for optical-fiber installation tasks,...

Metallized lenses.(new products)
August 1, 2007... Lenses can be delivered with metallized assembly surfaces to provide a soldered connection for the collimation optics of high-power diode lasers. The surfaces provide long-term stability for optics in applications with high acceleration forces,...

OPO.(new products)
August 1, 2007... The Argos single-frequency, continuous-wave optical parametric oscillator provides widely tunable near-to mid-IR output for applications such as photoacoustic and cavity-ringdown spectroscopy for trace-gas detection. The fiber-pumped OPO...

Air-bearing stages.(new products)
August 1, 2007... The ABRT series of rotary air-bearing stages provides 360[degrees] continuous travel with resolution to 0.027 arcs and a payload capacity up to 69 kg. Asynchronous measurement for axial and radial error motion is less than 20 nm and less than...

GaAs photodiodes.(new products)
August 1, 2007... A GaAs photodiode array for use in quad small-form-factor pluggable optical transceivers provides bandwidth of 5 Gbit/s per channel. Each optical aperture has a diameter of 100 [micro]m for ease of optical alignment. Capacitance is 400 fF at...

TFT LCDs.(new products)
August 1, 2007... Thin-film-transister liquid-crystal displays with VGA and XGA resolution are backlit by LED rails that are addressable via the company's PRISMA II industrial controller board, which can switch between day and night modes. The setup eliminates...