Q switching by saturable absorption in microdroplets: elastic scattering and laser emission

Dispersion compensation in whispering-gallery modes

We show that manipulation by a spatial profile of the refractive index of a circularly symmetric dielectric cavity results in a novel way of fine tuning frequency separations as well as spatial localizations of high-Q whispering-gallery modes excited in the cavity. The method permits dispersion compensation in the modes (spectrum equalization), diminishes the quality-factor limitation by surface roughness and contamination, and allows critical coupling to ultra-high-Q modes without maintaining an air gap with evanescent couplers.

Slow light, induced dispersion, enhanced nonlinearity, and optical solitons in a resonator-array waveguide

We describe an optical transmission line that consists of an array of wavelength-scale optical disk resonators coupled to an optical waveguide. Such a structure leads to exotic optical characteristics, including ultraslow group velocities of propagation, enhanced optical nonlinearities, and large dispersion with a controllable magnitude and sign. This device supports soliton propagation, which can be described by a generalized nonlinear Schrodinger equation.

Sensitive disk resonator photonic biosensor

We describe a photonic device based on a high-finesse, whispering-gallery-mode disk resonator that can be used for the detection of biological pathogens. This device operates by means of monitoring the change in transfer characteristics of the disk resonator when biological materials fall onto its active area. High sensitivity is achieved because the light wave interacts many times with each pathogen as a consequence of the resonant recirculation of light within the disk structure. Specificity of the detected substance can be achieved when a layer of antibodies or other binding material is deposited onto the active area of the resonator. Formulas are presented that allow the sensitivity of the device to be quantified and that show that, under optimum conditions, as few as 100 molecules can be detected.

Scattering and Internal Fields of a Microsphere that Contains a Saturable Absorber: Finite-Difference Time-Domain Simulations

Illumination intensities that are used to induce scattering and fluorescence in aerosols can be large enough to cause variations in the refractive index. Methods used to calculate the scattering from homogeneous particles may not be valid for these systems. We use the finite-difference time-domain method and an iterative technique to model scattering by microspheres that contain a saturable absorber. We illustrate this technique by calculating the scattering from spheres that contain tryptophan. We show the Mueller scattering matrices along with the internal intensity distributions for different incident intensities. The backscattering increases as the illumination intensity becomes large enough to saturate the absorption in regions of the sphere.

Analysis of the influence of absorption on spatial field structures of morphology-dependent resonances in cylindrical microparticles

Morphology-dependent resonances in cylindrical microparticles are investigated and the properties of particle matter considered. The spatial structures of resonance modes inside microparticles are studied. It is shown that the resonant mode with a lesser quality factor can have a higher value of internal field intensity inside microparticles. Considering a small amount of absorption of particle matter permits more-or-less exact prediction of the value of the internal field intensity, which may increase or decrease, depending on the properties of the particle matter.