Eurekalert June 28, 2018
An international team of researchers (USA – Sandia National Laboratories, Germany) has developed an optical mixer using an array of nanocylinders made from gallium arsenide laid out in a square pattern about 840 nanometers apart from one another. They selected two near infrared lasers with wavelengths tuned to the metamaterial’s resonant frequencies. The light from the two lasers — call them frequencies A and B — mix to produce 11 colors from different mixing products including A+A, A+B, B+B, A+A+B, and A+B+B, and so on. This was accomplished without the need to change angles or match phases. Switchable, tunable lasers could be useful in biological, chemical and atmospheric research; remote sensing; fiber-optics-based communication and quantum optics… read more. Open Access TECHNICAL ARTICLE
The metamaterial mixes two lasers to produce 11 colors ranging from the near infrared, through the colors of the rainbow, to ultraviolet. CREDIT: Photo by Randy Montoya