Resolution improvement in aerial imaging by a retroreflector using micro aperture arrays.

For a floating display system using a prism- or bead-type retroreflector, non-retroreflected light is the key cause of the deterioration in image resolution. In the present study, a micro aperture array was used to enhance the image resolution of aerial imaging displays based on prism and bead retroreflectors. The effects of different micro aperture parameters on the divergence angle of the retroreflector were experimentally studied, and the modulation of the point spread function of different retroreflectors was also explored in detail. The experimental results showed that by properly arranging the micro aperture array, the divergence angle of the retroreflective light could be effectively reduced. Moreover, the full width at half maximum of the point spread function of the retroreflector was effectively narrowed. Finally, after the modulation of the micro aperture array, the imaging resolution was increased by 115%-150% compared to the original resolution. The proposed micro array is low cost, easy to process, and flexible and can be applied to a retroreflector-based aerial imaging system to provide high image quality.

Semidiscrete optical vortex droplets in quasi-phase-matched photonic crystals.

What we believe is a new scheme for producing semidiscrete self-trapped vortices ("swirling photon droplets") in photonic crystals with competing quadratic (χ(2)) and self-defocusing cubic (χ(3)) nonlinearities is proposed. The photonic crystal is designed with a striped structure, in the form of spatially periodic modulation of the χ(2) susceptibility, which is imposed by the quasi-phase-matching technique. Unlike previous realizations of semidiscrete optical modes in composite media, built as combinations of continuous and arrayed discrete waveguides, the semidiscrete vortex "droplets" are produced here in the fully continuous medium. This work reveals that the system supports two types of semidiscrete vortex droplets, viz., onsite- and intersite-centered ones, which feature, respectively, odd and even numbers of stripes, N. Stability areas for the states with different values of N are identified in the system's parameter space. Some stability areas overlap with each other, giving rise to the multistability of states with different N. The coexisting states are mutually degenerate, featuring equal values of the Hamiltonian and propagation constant. An experimental scheme to realize the droplets is outlined, suggesting new possibilities for the long-distance transmission of nontrivial vortex beams in nonlinear media.

Vortex Solitons in Quasi-Phase-Matched Photonic Crystals.

We report solutions for stable compound solitons in a three-dimensional quasi-phase-matched photonic crystal with the quadratic (χ^{(2)}) nonlinearity. The photonic crystal is introduced with a checkerboard structure, which can be realized by means of the available technology. The solitons are built as four-peak vortex modes of two types, rhombuses and squares (intersite- and onsite-centered self-trapped states, respectively). Their stability areas are identified in the system's parametric space (rhombuses occupy an essentially broader stability domain), while all bright vortex solitons are subject to strong azimuthal instability in uniform χ^{(2)} media. Possibilities for experimental realization of the solitons are outlined.

Meta-learning-based optical vector beam high-fidelity communication under high scattering.

While spatial structured light based free space optical communication provides high-bandwidth communication with broad application prospect, severe signal distortion caused by optical scattering from ambient microparticles in the atmosphere can lead to data degradation. A deep-learning-based adaptive demodulator has been demonstrated to resolve the information encoded in the severely distorted channel, but the high generalization ability for different scattering always requires prohibitive costs on data preparation and reiterative training. Here, we demonstrate a meta-learning-based auto-encoder demodulator, which learns from prior theoretical knowledge, and then training with only three realistic samples per class can rectify and recognize transmission distortion. By employing such a demodulator to hybrid vector beams, high fidelity communication can be established, and data costs are reduced when faced with different scattering channels. In a proof-of-principle experiment, an image with 256 gray values is transmitted under severe scattering with an error ratio of less than 0.05%. Our work opens the door to high-fidelity optical communication in random media environments.

Geometric phase with full-wedge and half-wedge rotation in nonlinear frequency conversion.

When the quasi-phase matching (QPM) parameters of the χ(2) nonlinear crystal rotate along a closed path, geometric phase will be generated in the signal and idler waves that participate in the nonlinear frequency conversion. In this paper, we study two rotation schemes, full-wedge rotation and half-wedge rotation, of the QPM parameters in the process of fully nonlinear three-wave mixing. These two schemes can effectively suppress the uncertainty in creating the geometric phase in the nonlinear frequency conversion process when the intensity of the pump is depleted. The finding of this paper provides an avenue toward constant control of the geometric phase in nonlinear optics applications and quantum information processing.

Tuning of Supramolecular Architectures of l-Valine-Containing Dicyanoplatinum(II) 2,2'-Bipyridine Complexes by Metal-Metal, π-π Stacking, and Hydrogen-Bonding Interactions.

A series of newly synthesized dicyanoplatinum(II) 2,2'-bipyridine complexes exhibits self-assembly properties in solution after the incorporation of the l-valine amino units appended with various hydrophobic motifs. These l-valine-derived substituents were found to have critical control over the aggregation behaviors of the complexes in the solution state. On one hand, one of the complexes was found to exhibit interesting circularly polarized luminescence (CPL) signals at low temperature due to the formation of chiral spherical aggregates in the temperature-dependent studies. On the other hand, systematic transformation from less uniform aggregates to well-defined fibrous and rod-like structures via Pt⋅⋅⋅Pt and π-π stacking interactions has also been observed in the mixed-solvent studies. These changes were monitored by UV/Vis absorption, emission, circular dichroism (CD), and CPL spectroscopies, and morphologies were studied by electron microscopy.

Image restoration through thin turbid layers by correlation with a known object.

A method to recover the image of an object behind thin turbid layers is developed by wavefront shaping technique. The optimized wavefront is generated by modulating the scattering light of a known object with a spatial light modulator. A Pearson Correlation Coefficient is introduced as a cost function for the optimization. A beam scanning method based on optical memory effect is proposed to further enlarge the Field-of-View (FOV). The experimental results show good fidelity and large FOV of the recovered image.

Fraunhofer computer-generated hologram for diffused 3D scene in Fresnel region.

A Fraunhofer computer-generated hologram (CGH) is proved to be valid in display for three-dimensional (3D) objects from the Fresnel to the far-field region without a Fourier lens for reconstruction. To quickly compute large and complicated 3D objects that consist of slanted diffused surfaces in the Fresnel region, a Fraunhofer-based analytical approach using a basic-triangle tiling diffuser is developed. Both theoretical and experimental results reveal that Fraunhofer CGH can perform the same effects as Fresnel CGH but require less calculation time. Impressive 3D solid effects are achieved in the Fresnel region.

High-speed full analytical holographic computations for true-life scenes.

We develop a novel method to generate hologram of three-dimensional (3D) textured triangle-mesh-model that is reconstructed from ordinary digital photos. This method allows analytically encoding the 3D model consisting of triangles. In contrast to other polygon based holographic computations, our full analytical method will free oneself from the numerical error that is in the angular spectrum due to the Whittaker-Shannon sampling. In order to saving the computation time, we employ the GPU platform that is remarkably superior to the CPU's. We have rendered a true-life scene with colored textures as the first demo by our homemade software. The holographic reconstructed scene possesses high performances in many aspects such as depth cues, surface textures, shadings, and occlusions, etc. The GPU's algorithm performs hundreds of times faster than those of CPU.

Extended depth-resolved imaging through a thin scattering medium with PSF manipulation.

Human ability to visualize an image is usually hindered by optical scattering. Recent extensive studies have promoted imaging technique through turbid materials to a reality where color image can be restored behind scattering media in real time. The big challenge now is to recover objects in a large field of view with depth resolving ability. Based on the existing research results, we systematically study the physical relationship between speckles generated from objects at different planes. By manipulating a given single point spread function, depth-resolved imaging through a thin scattering medium can be extended beyond the original depth of field (DOF). Experimental testing of standard scattering media shows that the DOF can be extended up to 5 times and the physical mechanism is depicted. This extended DOF is benefit to 3D imaging through scattering environment, and it is expected to have important applications in science, technology, bio-medical, security and defense.

High speed color imaging through scattering media with a large field of view.

Optical imaging through complex media has many important applications. Although research progresses have been made to recover optical image through various turbid media, the widespread application of the technology is hampered by the recovery speed, requirement on specific illumination, poor image quality and limited field of view. Here we demonstrate that above-mentioned drawbacks can be essentially overcome. The realization of high speed color imaging through turbid media is successfully carried out by taking into account the media memory effect, the point spread function, the exit pupil of the optical system, and the optimized signal to noise ratio. By retrieving selected speckles with enlarged field of view, high quality image is recovered with a responding speed only determined by the frame rates of the image capturing devices. The immediate application of the technique is expected to register static and dynamic imaging under human skin to recover information with a wearable device.

Designing nanobowl arrays of mesoporous TiO2 as an alternative electron transporting layer for carbon cathode-based perovskite solar cells.

In this work, we have designed a mesoporous TiO2 nanobowl (NB) array with pore size, bowl size and film thickness being easily controllable by the sol-gel process and the polystyrene (PS) template diameter. Based on the TiO2 NB array, we fabricated carbon cathode based perovskite solar cells (C-PSCs) to investigate the impact of TiO2 NB nanostructures on the performance of the as-obtained C-PSCs devices. As expected, the TiO2 NB based devices show a higher power conversion efficiency (PCE) than that of the planar counterpart, mainly due to the enhanced light absorption arising from the NB-assisted light management, the improved pore-filling of high quality perovskite crystals and the increased interface contact for rapid electron extraction and fast charge transport. Leveraging these advantages of the novel TiO2 NB film, the 220 nm-PS templated TiO2 NB based devices performed the best on both light absorption capability and charge extraction, and achieved a PCE up to 12.02% with good stability, which is 37% higher than that of the planar counterpart. These results point to a viable and convenient route toward the fabrication of TiO2 ETL nanostructures for high performance PSCs.

Pinhole-Free and Surface-Nanostructured NiOx Film by Room-Temperature Solution Process for High-Performance Flexible Perovskite Solar Cells with Good Stability and Reproducibility.

Recently, researchers have focused on the design of highly efficient flexible perovskite solar cells (PVSCs), which enables the implementation of portable and roll-to-roll fabrication in large scale. While NiOx is a promising material for hole transport layer (HTL) candidate for fabricating efficient PVSCs on a rigid substrate, the reported NiOx HTLs are formed using different multistep treatments (such as 300-500 °C annealing, O2-plasma, UVO, etc.), which hinders the development of flexible PVSCs based on NiOx. Meanwhile, the features of nanostructured morphology and flawless film quality are very important for the film to function as highly effective HTL of PVSCs. However, it is difficult to have the two features coexist natively, particularly in a solution process that flawless film will usually come with smooth morphology. Here, we demonstrate the flawless and surface-nanostructured NiOx film from a simple and controllable room-temperature solution process for achieving high performance flexible PVSCs with good stability and reproducibility. The power conversion efficiency (PCE) can reaches a promising value of 14.53% with no obvious hysteresis (and a high PCE of 17.60% for PVSC on ITO glass). Furthermore, the NiOx-based PVSCs show markedly improved air stability. Regarding the performance improvement, the flawless and surface-nanostructured NiOx film can make the interfacial recombination and monomolecular Shockley-Read-Hall recombination of PVSC reduce. In addition, the formation of an intimate junction of large interfacial area at NiOx film/the perovskite layer improve the hole extraction and thus PVSC performances. This work contributes to the evolution of flexible PVSCs with simple fabrication process and high device performances.

A PCBM Electron Transport Layer Containing Small Amounts of Dual Polymer Additives that Enables Enhanced Perovskite Solar Cell Performance.

A polymer/PCBM hybrid electron transport layer is reported that enables high-performance perovskite solar cells with a high power conversion efficiency of 16.2% and with negligible hysteresis. Unlike previous approaches of reducing hysteresis by thermal annealing or fullerene passivation, the success of our approach can be mainly attributed to the doping of the PCBM layer using an insulating polymer (polystyrene) and an amine-containing polymeric semiconductor named PFNOX.

Controlled light field concentration through turbid biological membrane for phototherapy.

Laser propagation through a turbid rat dura mater membrane is shown to be controllable with a wavefront modulation technique. The scattered light field can be refocused into a target area behind the rat dura mater membrane with a 110 times intensity enhancement using a spatial light modulator. The efficient laser intensity concentration system is demonstrated to imitate the phototherapy for human brain tumors. The power density in the target area is enhanced more than 200 times compared with the input power density on the dura mater membrane, thus allowing continued irradiation concentration to the deep lesion without damage to the dura mater. Multibeam inputs along different directions, or at different positions, can be guided to focus to the same spot behind the membrane, hence providing a similar gamma knife function in optical spectral range. Moreover, both the polarization and the phase of the input field can be recovered in the target area, allowing coherent field superposition in comparison with the linear intensity superposition for the gamma knife.