The material that gets everything on the same wavelength
- Microcomb Science and Technology
- Sensing and Measurement
Every time we send an email or a WhatsApp message, it’s pulses of light travelling through optical fibres around the world that make it possible. That’s photonics – the science of generating and manipulating light.
Because of decades of internet-driven research, most photonic chips today are designed for the infrared part of the light spectrum – perfect for telecommunications, but not so useful for other fields.
Applications like biomedical imaging need visible light. Astronomy needs UV. To take advantage of the advances in telecommunications, we need a way to move light around to open up other parts of the light spectrum.
A material called lithium niobate – which is in fact an artificial crystal – has had a resurgence in popularity due to its ability to move light around on a microchip – to the visible for biomedical applications, and to UV for astronomy.
Lithium niobate helps silicon microchips to get on the same wavelength as those its applications needs.
But only recently did it become so accessible, thanks to a technique that can turn the artificial crystal into a ‘thin film’. And now we have ‘thin-film lithium niobate’ that has made it possible to make more compact and complex circuits, with less energy.
This new era of thin-film lithium niobate makes it very useful for our Centre’s optical microcombs – the world’s most accurate measurement tool – so we can easily adapt our chips to be on the same wavelength as their application requires.
To explore the full potential of thin-film lithium niobate for biomedical applications in the visible wavelengths, or for astronomy in the UV wavelengths, our Director Arnan Mitchell, and Chief Investigator Andy Boes are at the Lithium Niobate Summer School in Ecole de Physique Les Houches. They’re sharing knowledge and exploring new research partnerships with other lithium niobate leaders in the field, in the hope to make some of these applications possible!
Read more about the school: www.houches-school-physics.com/program/program-2025/lithium-niobate-on-insulator-integrated-photonics-from-fabrication-to-classical-and-quantum-applications-1482122.kjsp
