Tutorials in Complex Photonic Media

Editor(s): Mikhail A. Noginov; Graeme Dewar; Martin W. McCall; Nikolay I. Zheludev

Published: 2009

PDF ISBN: 9780819480934 | Print ISBN: 9780819477736

DESCRIPTION

The field of complex photonic media encompasses many leading-edge areas in physics, chemistry, nanotechnology, materials science, and engineering. In Tutorials in Complex Photonic Media, leading experts have brought together 19 tutorials on breakthroughs in modern optics, such as negative refraction, chiral media, plasmonics, photonic crystals, and organic photonics.

This text will help students, engineers, and scientists entering the field to become familiar with the interrelated aspects of the subject. It also serves well as a supplemental text in introductory and advanced courses on optical materials, nanotechnology, physical optics, or photonic metamaterials.

View Sample Pages (PDF)

|

View Excerpt+

EXCERPT

An increasingly large number of high- and low-tech technologies and devices benefit from employing optics and photonics phenomena, the latter originally being termed photon-based electronics. Progress in the research fields of optics and photonics, which have both experienced continuously strong growth over the last few decades, critically depends on the understanding and utilization of the physical, chemical and structural properties of optical materials. The optical materials used in traditional optics technology were macroscopically homogeneous in that their scale of inhomogeneity was much less than the wavelength. In more recent years, multiple breakthroughs have involved inhomogeneous, composite, and multiphase materials, whose structures are either photoinduced or determined by synthesis or fabrication. Examples include holography, optics of scattering media, and metamaterials. These breakthroughs make photonic materials inherently complex. The broad range of physical phenomena underlying complex photonic media makes it difficult for scientists, engineers, and students entering the field to navigate through the range of topics and to understand clearly how they relate to each other. The purpose of this book is to provide the necessary coverage and inspire the reader’s curiosity about the fascinating subject of complex photonic media. All of the tutorial chapters are designed to start with the basics and gradually move toward discussion of more advanced topics. We thus envisage that students and scholars with diverse backgrounds and levels of expertise will find this text interesting and useful. The book can be used as a supplemental text in courses on nanotechnology or optical materials, or a variety of other courses. It can also be used as the main text in a more focused course aimed at fundamental properties of scattering media and metamaterials. The anticipated level of preparation is equivalent to advanced senior undergraduate level, beginning graduate level, or higher.