Laser Focus World articles from November 2005

Laser Focus World archives from November 2005

Seeing clearly ...(editor's desk)
November 1, 2005... Many of today's advanced technologies were initially born out of a military need. A significant amount of R&D into high-energy lasers, for instance, has been driven by the desire for directed-energy weapons. And along with the high-energy laser...

Temporal superresolution introduced for ultrashort laser pulses.(news breaks)
November 1, 2005... Analogous to imposing a mask on the instrument pupil of a microscope to achieve optical superresolution for imaging systems, scientists at Ecole Polytechnique (Palaiseau, France) have used spectral phase masks to shape a laser pulse into a...

New optical fiber breaks effective-mode-diameter limit.(news breaks)
November 1, 2005... Fiber nonlinear effects that limit the peak power of fiber lasers can be overcome by using optical fibers with a large effective mode area, so scientists have been experimenting with different fiber designs that meet this criterion and can...

Remote-imaging LIBS cleans far-off objects.(news breaks)
November 1, 2005... Scientists in the Atomic Physics Division of the Lund Institute of Technology (Lund, Sweden) have demonstrated remote-imaging laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) and its use in remote ablative cleaning of stone surfaces. The...

Fiber laser forum debuts at Photonics West.(news breaks)
November 1, 2005... Fiber lasers and their potential in commercial, industrial, and medical markets will be the focus of several talks at the annual Laser and Photonics Marketplace Seminar, to be held Jan. 23, 2006, at the Fairmont Hotel in San Jose, CA, in...

Tiny force limits practical size of nanodevices.(news breaks)
November 1, 2005... Researchers at the University of Arizona (Tucson, AZ) have measured for the first time, to their knowledge, the de Broglie wave phase shift caused by atom-surface interactions. The tiny force, caused by the polarization of atoms in fluctuating...

Room-temperature bipolar-transistor laser advances.(news breaks)
November 1, 2005... Transistor lasers capable of operating at room temperature could facilitate faster signal processing, large-capacity seamless communications, and higher-performance electrical and optical integrated circuits. In fact, room-temperature operation...

Vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser yields tunable ultraslow light.(news breaks)
November 1, 2005... Researchers at the University of California-Berkeley and Texas A&M University (College Station, TX) have operated a vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) as a Fabry-Perot amplifier to demonstrate tunable group delays of broadband...

Nobel Prize in physics awarded to three optics researchers.(news breaks)
November 1, 2005... This year's Nobel Prize in physics was awarded to three scientists in the field of optics. Roy Glauber of Harvard University (Cambridge, MA) was awarded half the prize for his quantum-mechanical theory of optical coherence, while John Hall of...

Crystalline/amorphous photovoltaics combine with fuel cell in solar house.(news breaks)
November 1, 2005... Photovoltaic (PV) cells as a very large-scale source of electrical power are not yet practical, in part because sunshine is inconstant. Directly injecting PV output into the power grid works only if PV power remains a minor (and thus...

Photon sciences continue expansion into the nano realm.(CONFERENCE REVIEW)
November 1, 2005... In a keynote address describing a 1-km-long free-electron x-ray laser, Keith Hodgson, deputy director of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC), set an upbeat tone for this year's annual meeting of the Stanford Photonics Research Center...

Optical technique may diagnose Alzheimer's.(optoelectronics world news)
November 1, 2005... Two laser-imaging techniques, one in clinical trials and the other in preclinical evaluation, may hold the long-sought key to diagnosis, treatment, and even prevention of Alzheimer's disease and several related ailments, according to results...

Optical fibers support slow and fast light at room temperature.(NONLINEAR FIBEROPTICS)
November 1, 2005... A groundbreaking demonstration of wide optical control of group velocity of light within a fiber may clear the way for the development of fast-access memories and optically controlled delay lines for optical computing and fiberoptic...

Achromatic nuller has common path.(INTERFEROMETRY)
November 1, 2005... Large extrasolar planets can be detected by the dip in intensity they cause as they pass in front of the star they orbit, or by the wobble they induce in the star's position. But as much as we like to find gas giants orbiting other stars, we...

Ironies mark colorful life of Gordon Gould.(OBITUARY)
November 1, 2005... Barely three weeks before the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to three optics and laser scientists (see p. 11), Gordon Gould died at the age of 85 in Lenox Hill Hospital (New York, NY). It's not hard to imagine that Gould, who fathered...

Mobile holography system records 3-D portraits for planning surgery.(HOLOGRAPHY)
November 1, 2005... Holography systems have traditionally been bulky, requiring heavy optical tables. But now that pulsed compact narrowband laser sources are available, such systems can be made small enough to be transportable to the scene that is to be recorded....

Compact EUV laser enables nanoimaging.(EUV IMAGING)
November 1, 2005... As nanotechnology progresses, improvements in nanoscale imaging tools are required to increase the resolution of nanometer-size features. To date, the best resolution of 15 nm is obtained by imaging with 1.52-nm wavelength soft-x-ray...

Fluorescence-microscopy technique has high photon-count rate per molecule.(LOW-LIGHT-LEVEL DETECTION)
November 1, 2005... Spotting individual or small groups of molecules, and identifying them through spectroscopy, is becoming increasingly important in biological and medical research. Fluorescence-correlation spectroscopy (FCS), in which fluctuations in...

Curved field aids scanning design.(MICROSCOPY)
November 1, 2005... An adaptive scanning optical microscope (ASOM) developed by researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI; Troy, NY) combines adaptive optics with a clever use of a curved image field; the result is an instrument that scans very large...

New design tool developed for MOPAs.(SOLID-STATE LASERS)
November 1, 2005... A collaboration between Advanced Optical Technology (AOT; Basildon, England) and the Department of Physics at Hull University (Hull, England) has produced a new tool to help in the design of Q-switched master-oscillator and power-amplifier...

Rugged fiberoptic links target challenging RF applications.(FREE-SPACE OPTICS)
November 1, 2005... A packaging technique for optical modules that incorporates off-the-shelf components placed and maintained in position with submicron accuracy for free-space optical transmission is providing high-frequency RF (radio-frequency) fiberoptic links...

Two-photon fluorescence microendoscopy aids cellular research.(DIAGNOSTIC IMAGING)
November 1, 2005... Researchers at Stanford University (Stanford, CA) have demonstrated a two-photon fluorescence microendoscope that can capture micron-scale images from deep in the brains of live subjects--in a package small enough to fit in the palm of a hand....

Kerr gating helps detect street drugs.(SPECTROSCOPY)
November 1, 2005... The development of a technique for analyzing street drugs that overcomes accuracy problems associated with other methods could pave the way toward future portable detection systems used in crime-scene investigations. Scientists from the...

Dust mix could negatively refract light.(OPTICAL MATERIALS)
November 1, 2005... Fabricating a negative-refractive-index lens that works well at visible wavelengths and is of reasonable size would be a coup for any photonics researcher. Such a lens, made of a flat slab of metamaterial--a properly designed array of...

Silicon photonics moves toward practical use.(CONFERENCE REVIEW)
November 1, 2005... Integrated optoelectronics that leverage microelectronics technology are being developed around the world. Recent work on devices made using silicon (Si), germanium (Ge), carbon, and tin was presented in late September at the Second...

Carbon nanotubes target cancer cells.(NANOPHOTONICS)
November 1, 2005... A new noninvasive laser therapy that uses the strong optical absorbance of single-walled carbon nanotubes in the 700- to 1100-nm wavelength range has been shown to selectively destroy cancer cells while leaving healthy ones unharmed. (1)...

High power pump source for fiber lasers and material processing.(ADVANCE DIODE LASER TECHNOLOGY)
November 1, 2005... A series of high power, high brightness, fiber-coupled laser diode devices are now available for industrial and medical applications from Apollo Instruments. The laser products are based on a new beam shaping technology developed by the company...

JDSU to acquire Agility.(laser industry report)
November 1, 2005... In a move that positions it as a major player in the rapidly growing market for tunable lasers and transponders, ]DS Uniphase (San Jose, CA) has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Agility Communications (Santa Barbara, CA), a...

LED lighting aids hurricane rebuilding.(laser industry report)
November 1, 2005... Carmanah Technologies (Victoria, BC, Canada), supplier of solar-powered LED lighting, is rushing to fill orders for hundreds of lights to rebuild facilities destroyed by Hurricane Katrina on the Gulf Coast of the United States. In the week...

Lidar moves self-driving car closer to reality.(laser industry report)
November 1, 2005... In April of last year, E.U. governments signed the European Road Safety Charter aimed at cutting the number of road deaths in half by 2010. One approach toward achieving this goal is a light detection and ranging (lidar) system that is being...

SPI Lasers sets sights on London Stock Exchange.(laser industry report)
November 1, 2005... Fiber laser specialist SPI Lasers (Southampton, England) is seeking admission to the Alternative Investment Market (AIM) of the London Stock Exchange. At the launch, estimated to be in late October or early November, "SPI Lasers plc" will...

Cubic awarded optical tags R&D contract.(laser industry report)
November 1, 2005... The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) awarded Cubic Defense Applications (San Diego, CA) a 15-month, $6.1 million R&D contract to continue its work on Phase 2 of the Dynamic Optical Tags (DOTs) program. Cubic's DOTs allow...

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA, Washington, D.C.) and the Laser Institute of America (Orlando, FL) have formed an alliance to provide access to training resources.(also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA, Washington, D.C.) and the Laser Institute of America (Orlando, FL) have formed an alliance to provide access to training resources to help protect worker safety and health by reducing and...

Sabeus (Calabasas, CA), a manufacturer of acoustic sensing and telecommunications subsystems, has acquired laser developer Aragon Technologies.(also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Sabeus (Calabasas, CA), a manufacturer of acoustic sensing and telecommunications subsystems, has acquired laser developer Aragon Technologies (Van Nuys, CA) to develop a stable, low-phase-noise laser for oilfield and military sensing solutions...

Northrop Grumman.(also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Northrop Grumman (Melbourne, FL) received a $124.5 million U.S. Navy letter Contract for the Airborne Laser Mine Detection System (ALMDS) that uses a blue-green laser to detect moored and floating sea mines....

Lockheed Martin (Bethesda, MD) signed a definitive agreement to acquire Coherent Technologies.(also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Lockheed Martin (Bethesda, MD) signed a definitive agreement to acquire Coherent Technologies (Louisville, CO), a supplier of laser-based remote sensing systems....

Theralase Technologies.(also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... At September's Photonics North 2005, Theralase Technologies (Toronto, ON, Canada) announced FDA clearance for the U.S. marketing of its TLC-1000 therapeutic laser.

Thales to sell High Tech Optics group.(optics industry report)
November 1, 2005... Thales and Candover Investments (London, England) have agreed on the sale of Thales High Tech Optics (HTO) operations. Candover has acquired the businesses, regarded as nonstrategic for Thales, for a cash settlement of $265 million. Thales...

Ocean Optics offers hurricane assistance.(optics industry report)
November 1, 2005... In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Ocean Optics (Dunedin, FL) is offering special assistance to those in the optics and photonics industry affected by the devastating storm. The company is making available facilities for light industrial,...

Zygo opens new facility for process metrology.(optics industry report)
November 1, 2005... Zygo (Middlefield, CT), a supplier of optical metrology instruments, precision optics, and electro-optical design and manufacturing services, has opened a facility in Beaverton, OR, for its new semiconductor process metrology group, headed by...

MONA to coordinate optics and nanotech.(optics industry report)
November 1, 2005... The European Commission (EC) has launched a new project within its 6th Framework Programme that will contribute to the coordination of research in photonics and nanotechnologies, the MONA project (Merging Optics and Nanotechnologies). The...

RPO producing Kodak lenses.(optics industry report)
November 1, 2005... Kodak has reached an agreement with Rochester Precision Optics (RPO; Rochester, NY) to sell RPO the assets used to produce precision glass molded aspheres, spherical lenses, and lens assemblies. RPO will provide precision molded and machined...

HORIBA Jobin Yvon.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... HORIBA Jobin Yvon has opened a new applications facility in Longjumeau, France, for the demonstration of x-ray fluorescence spectrometers, sulphur-in-oil analyzers, and ICP atomic emission spectrometers....

Acacia Patent Acquisition.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Acacia Patent Acquisition (Newport Beach, CA) acquired the rights to patents relating to high-resolution optics used by the military and in commercial products....

The Georgia Institute of Technology.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... The Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta, GA) was awarded a grant totaling $4.16 million for photonic and phononic-crystal research by the Office of Naval Research (ONR)....

Ondax.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Ondax (Monrovia, CA), a developer of volume holographic gratings and wavelength-stabilized laser solutions, was awarded a two-year, $500,000 Phase II SBIR grant by the National Science Foundation to develop and produce multiline rejection...

Resolve Optics.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Resolve Optics (Chesham, England) launched a new website, www.resolveoptics. com, to provide an online resource for sourcing specialist lenses and optical designs....

The laser optics business of Photonic Products Group (Northvale, NJ) has expanded its production capacity for sets of indium antimonide (InSb) optical components used.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... The laser optics business of Photonic Products Group (Northvale, NJ) has expanded its production capacity for sets of indium antimonide (InSb) optical components used for imaging assemblies to fulfill its largest production order to date (more...

Goodrich to buy Sensors Unlimited.(imaging & detector industry report)
November 1, 2005... Goodrich (Charlotte, NC) entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Sensors Unlimited (Princeton, NJ) for $60 million in cash. Under the terms of the agreement, Goodrich will acquire a business that has pioneered the design and production...

Image sensors to top $4 billion in 2005.(imaging & detector industry report)
November 1, 2005... The image sensor and module market will exceed $4 billion in 2005, led by the camera-phone application, according to a new report from market research firm Strategies Unlimited (Mountain View, CA). The report, Image Sensor Market Review and...

Dow Corning forms Light Management group.(imaging & detector industry report)
November 1, 2005... Dow Corning (Midland, MI) plans to merge its Photonics Solutions business-development program with the company's mainstream electronics business, bringing it into the group headed by Tom Cook, Dow Corning's global-industry executive director....

Honeywell (Morris Township, NJ) granted a license authorizing Chunghwa Picture Tubes (CPT; Taiwan) to use a patented Honeywell technology.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Honeywell (Morris Township, NJ) granted a license authorizing Chunghwa Picture Tubes (CPT; Taiwan) to use a patented Honeywell technology that increases the brightness of images and reduces the appearance of certain interference effects on...

OTB Display (Eindhoven, the Netherlands) has signed and closed an agreement to acquire the PolyLED activity of Royal Philips Electronics (Heerlen, the Netherlands).(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... OTB Display (Eindhoven, the Netherlands) has signed and closed an agreement to acquire the PolyLED activity of Royal Philips Electronics (Heerlen, the Netherlands) to strengthen OTB's position as a worldwide manufacturer of turnkey production...

LG. Philips.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... LG. Philips (Seoul, Korea), a leading innovator of thin-film transistor liquid-crystal-display technology, signed an investment agreement with the governments of Poland and the municipality of Wroclaw to build a module plant in Wroclaw,...

Infrared Solutions (Plymouth, MN) has agreed to the sale of Infrared Solutions, a supplier of infrared thermal-imaging products.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Infrared Solutions (Plymouth, MN) has agreed to the sale of Infrared Solutions, a supplier of infrared thermal-imaging products, to Fluke Electronics (Everett, WA), an electronics manufacturer....

The Joint European Torus (JET) research group (Abingdon, England) placed an order with CEDIP Infrared Systems (Croissy-Beaubourg, France).(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... The Joint European Torus (JET) research group (Abingdon, England) placed an order with CEDIP Infrared Systems (Croissy-Beaubourg, France) to supply an advanced IR thermography system for monitoring the temperature of components inside its...

Pirelli launches new photonics business.(fiberoptics industry report)
November 1, 2005... Looking to capitalize more directly on the growing demand for high-bandwidth services in metro-access networks, the Pirelli Group (Milan, Italy) has established a new company that combines its existing photonics products with its broadband...

Fujitsu wins communication contract.(fiberoptics industry report)
November 1, 2005... Fujitsu Network Communications (Richardson, TX) announced that the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), the largest public power company in the United States, has awarded a federal contract to Fujitsu for a large optical communication network that...

Meriton acquires Mahi.(fiberoptics industry report)
November 1, 2005... Meriton Networks (Ottawa, ON, Canada) announced the acquisition of Mahi Networks (Piscataway, NJ), uniting Meriton's portfolio of high-speed optical networking systems with Mahi's reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexer (ROADM) solutions....

Working Group formed for transponders.(fiberoptics industry report)
November 1, 2005... Optical communications companies Essex (Columbia, MD), Kodeos Communications (South Plainfield, NJ), and TeraSea (Rehovot, Israel) have formed the 10-Gbit/s Optical Duo-Binary, Multi-Source Working Group (ODB MSWG). The group's objective is to...

KVH awarded $3.2 million order.(fiberoptics industry report)
November 1, 2005... In what they are calling a major milestone for the company, KVH Industries (Middletown, RI) has received a $3.2 million production order for its fiberoptic gyro (FOG)-based TG-6000 precision inertial measurement units (IMUs). Raytheon...

Nozomi Photonics (San Jose, CA), a supplier of high-speed optical switches, secured $8 million of funding.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Nozomi Photonics (San Jose, CA), a supplier of high-speed optical switches, secured $8 million of funding led by Japanese investor Globis Capital Partners....

Sabeus.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Sabeus (Calabasas, CA), developer of fiberoptic systems for acoustic sensing, intrusion detection, and surveillance applications, opened its newest production and R&D facility in Freeport, PA....

Wave7 Optics.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Wave7 Optics (Atlanta, GA) announced $18 million in additional funding to further develop its Last Mile Link and its next-generation fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) platform....

Capella Photonics.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Capella Photonics (San Jose, CA), a developer of wavelength-selective switch (WSS) modules for use in reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexer (ROADM) and optical cross connect (OXC) applications, announced the closing of $10 million in its...

Energis has selected Xtera Communications (Allen, TX) as the multireach DWDM supplier.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Energis has selected Xtera Communications (Allen, TX) as the multireach DWDM supplier for its next-generation backbone network in the United Kingdom....

Liekki.(Also in the news ...)
November 1, 2005... Liekki (Lohja, Finland), a supplier of highly doped optical fibers, is launching the Liekki University Program to offer qualified undergraduate and graduate university pro-efficient access to Liekki design and simulation software and fibers.

Life before [M.sup.2].(40 YEARS: THEN AND NOW)
November 1, 2005... The contrast between today's computer-fueled research, engineering, and development and the more-empirical approach to engineering that predominated around the time of the inception of Laser Focus in 1965 can be striking. Experiment will, of...

Coupling macro and micro codes enables integration of subwavelength features.(software & computing)
November 1, 2005... Interest has been growing in the ability to model optical systems that include subwavelength structures at one or more points in the system. As efforts continue to extend the limits of optical resolution and as more applications for new types...

Contrast and compare.(inside imaging)
November 1, 2005... For the most part, the machine-vision industry has comprised a relatively small number of companies with turnovers in the $20 million/year range. Consisting of sensor, camera, lighting, frame grabber, and software vendors, these companies have...

Silicon nanophotonics: a Mazerati or a Prius?(comment)
November 1, 2005... Recent achievements in silicon nanophotonics have reinvigorated the search for the monolithically integrated optoelectronic integrated circuit, or OEIC. One application that is getting a lot of attention is the chip-to-chip or on-chip...

How narrow should my focus be?(business forum)
November 1, 2005... Q: We are starting an OEM optical-components company that sells into many industries. Should we focus on a few or many applications? A: The right thing to do depends a lot on how you run your business; the devil is in the details. As a...

Adapting adaptive optics to aid human vision: adaptive optics can examine the eye and diagnose vision, but don't hold your breath for adaptive lenses to correct your sight.(PHOTONIC FRONTIERS: ADAPTIVE OPTICS)
November 1, 2005... The use of adaptive optics was initiated by efforts to develop high-energy laser weapons. The powerful beams of the lasers perturbed the atmosphere, prompting developers to devise adaptive optical systems to compensate for those perturbations...

LED automotive headlamps move closer to market.(HIGH-BRIGHTNESS LEDs)
November 1, 2005... Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) have had a reasonably successful history in penetrating the automotive lighting market over the past 20 years. While conventional LEDs have long been used for various indicator-lamp functions inside the car, it was...

The search continues for efficient terahertz sources.(TERAHERTZ SOURCES)
November 1, 2005... While nearly all parts of the electromagnetic spectrum are in frequent use, the far-infrared, or terahertz region from 100 GHz to 10 THz, is still relatively unexploited. Like microwaves, terahertz radiation can easily penetrate plastics,...

Compaction and rarefaction affect photolithography system lifetimes.(OPTICAL MATERIALS)
November 1, 2005... During the past 10 years, deep-ultraviolet excimer-laser-based systems emerged as the preferred light sources for manufacturing semiconductors. Krypton fluoride (KrF) sources operating at 248 nm have become the production workhorse, and the...

Using light for nanometric imaging: optical images with resolutions far below the diffraction limit aid researchers.(IMAGE ENGINEERING: MICROSCOPE IMAGING)
November 1, 2005... Hundreds of years of development in microscopy and spectroscopy have made optical imaging a tremendously useful tool for materials research and biology. But what happens when features shrink to sizes much smaller than visible wavelengths--so...

Optics go to extremes in EUV lithography.(UV OPTICS)
November 1, 2005... The features on integrated circuits continue to shrink according to Moore's Law. This shrinking also applies to the wavelength of light used in the lithography process that patterns the wafer. Critical layers in leading-edge chips are now made...

Performance factors characterize high-power laser-diode drivers.(POWER SUPPLIES)
November 1, 2005... The need to drive progressively higher-power diode-pumped solid-state lasers, laser-diode bars, and laser-diode stacks has driven system developers to seek quality laser-diode power sources with output currents ranging from 10 to more than 100...

Nonlinear microring resonators forge all-optical switch.(OPTICAL SWITCHES)
November 1, 2005... The microring resonator is a versatile component that provides a building block for fast, integrated, all-optical switches that lower cost and improve performance by reducing the number of optical-electronic conversions during a communication....

Diamond-like products.(new products)
November 1, 2005... The Diamonex line now includes new diamond-like coated glass for barcode scanning applications. The coated glass offers high hardness, chemical resistance, and low friction, resulting in less rescanning. Everscan windows exhibit diamond-like...

Galvanometer.(new products)
November 1, 2005... The QuantumScan-10 (QS-10) galvanometer is designed for 8- to 15-mm-aperture mirrors. Features include increased strength magnets and low resistance/low inductance coils to provide a 40% increase in scanning speeds compared to previous models....

Three-axis system.(new products)
November 1, 2005... The Axialscan three-axis system produces tiny focused spots while processing large fields. It is now available with the RLT-19 Linear Translator, which increases speed by more than 60%, allowing processing speeds faster than 16 m/s in a 500 x...

Machine-vision cameras.(new products)
November 1, 2005... The enhanced models IK-TF5C and IK-TF7C 3CCD color machine-vision cameras are designed with Camera Link outputs. The IK-TF5 provides 180 frames/s and the IK-TF7 offers 90 frames/s. Both have 1/100 to 1/100,000-s electronic shutter capability...