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We discuss the engineering of the spatial and temporal properties of both the electric permittivity and the refractive index of materials is at the core of photonics. When vanishing to zero, those two variables provide efficient knobs to control light–matter interactions. This Perspective aims at...

Light-matter interaction in materials is central to several photonic devices from lasers to detectors. Over the past decade, nanophotonics, the study of how light flows on the nanometer scale in engineered structures such as photonic crystals and metamaterials has led to important advances. This...

Check out our recent News & View article ‘Symmetry breaking in thermal photonics.’ in Light: Science and Applications. Thermal radiation is omnipresent and is engineered for various applications in modern photonics, such as cooling, imaging, and energy harvesting. Symmetries and symmetry breaking...

A new approach to control forces and interactions between atoms and molecules, such as those employed by geckos to climb vertical surfaces, could bring advances in new materials for developing quantum light sources.

A newly described property related to the "spin" and momentum of light waves suggests potential practical applications in photonic communications and photonic circuits. Scientists already knew that light waves have an electric field that can rotate as they propagate, which is known as the polarization property of light, and that light waves carry momentum in their direction of motion. In new findings, researchers have discovered a "spin-momentum locking," meaning, for example, light waves that spin in a counterclockwise direction can only move forward, and vice versa.

Researchers at Purdue University have created a quantum spin wave for light. This can be a carrier of information for future nanotechnologies but with a unique twist: they only flow in one direction.

Manufacturers frequently use coatings to protect the structural stability of engines or power generators operating at high temperatures. Ceramic shields, however, have not been able to adequately address a critical, performance-limiting factor: heat radiation. A new ceramic coating from Purdue University acts as a kind of thermal antenna, using light-matter oscillations, or polaritrons, to control the direction and electromagnetic spectrum of thermal radiation.