PFI-TT: Development of high-performance nanostructured polarizers

这个PFI项目更广泛的影响/商业潜力是基于高性能偏振器的变革性新想法。这些类型的光学部件在实践中广泛应用，例如，在电信系统、激光技术、医学传感器系统、电视屏幕和成像仪器中。该项目为具有新操作制度和适用性的开创性设备技术奠定了基础。同时，该项目通过阐明无损纳米结构谐振膜的光学特性和实用性来增强科学和技术理解，该设备的概念是基于此的。这些研究和开发活动将加强美国在纳米光子学和超材料方面的竞争力。此外，该项目还在工业界和学术界之间建立了伙伴关系。一个学术团队将提供设备设计规范和原型制造。一个主要的工业合作伙伴将可能通过现有的销售和营销平台分销符合规格的偏振片。该项目为研究生和博士后研究员提供了优秀的分析和实验经验。该项目可能具有很高的商业影响，因为目前市场上还不存在具有预测性能属性的拟议专利申请中的无损偏振器。拟议的项目提供了新的偏振器技术的基础上，在光子器件工程的原始想法。该技术的智力价值在于我们发现的新奇，即介电纳米线的稀疏网格对于一个偏振态几乎完全不可见，而对于正交偏振态是不透明的，该特性存在于显著宽的光谱带上。在这些最小共振系统中可以产生所提出的高效宽带光谱，这在科学上是极其重要的。基于这一发现，我们的研究目标集中在设计，制造和测试的紧凑，低损耗，介电偏振器部署在关键的光谱区域。因此，我们将设计和制造简单的单层元件以及纳米网格多模块晶格，使用各种实用材料提供优异的性能。我们计划制造的设备和比较与理论预测的完整的光谱验证。我们将测量偏振性能，包括带宽和消光比的反射和透射的个人两个光栅模块和级联的多层模块。技术目标包括1，000，000：1的高偏振消光比和低于1%的插入损耗。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this PFI project is grounded in transformational new ideas for high-performance polarizers. These types of optical components are widely applied in practice, for example, in telecommunication systems, laser technology, medical sensor systems, television screens, and imaging instrumentation. The project lays a foundation for a pioneering device technology with new operational regimes and applicability. Simultaneously, the project enhances scientific and technological understanding by elucidating the optical properties and utility of lossless nanostructured resonant films on which the device concept is based. These research and development activities will strengthen US competitiveness in nanophotonics and metamaterials. Moreover, this project establishes partnerships between industry and academia. An academic team will provide device design specifications and prototype fabrication. A primary industrial partner will potentially distribute polarizes meeting specifications via existing sales and marketing platforms. The project provides excellent analytical and experimental experience for both graduate students and postdoctoral fellows. The project is likely to have high commercial impact, as the proposed patent-pending lossless polarizers with the predicted performance attributes do not currently exist in the market. The proposed project delivers new polarizer technology based on original ideas in photonic device engineering. The intellectual merit of this technology lies in the novelty of our discovery that a sparse grid of dielectric nanowires is nearly completely invisible to one polarization state while being opaque to the orthogonal polarization state with this property existing over significantly wide spectral bands. It is scientifically extremely important that the high-efficiency, wideband spectra presented can be generated in these minimal resonance systems. Based on this discovery, our research objectives focus on design, fabrication and testing of compact, low-loss, dielectric polarizers for deployment in key spectral regions. Accordingly, we will design and fabricate simple single-layer elements as well as nanogrid multi-module lattices that provide excellent performance using a variety of practical materials. We plan complete spectral verification of the fabricated devices and comparison with theoretical predictions. We will measure polarization performance including bandwidth and extinction ratios in reflection and transmission of individual two-grating modules and of concatenated multilayer modules. Technical goals include high polarization extinction ratios of 1,000,000:1 and insertion loss below 1%. Manufacturing strategies involving high-resolution UV-laser interferometric patterning and carefully chosen materials will accomplish the goals of the project.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.