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Shaping light in space and time: from solitons and frequency combs to metasurfaces and structured light

By: Marco Piccardo
From: Departamento de Física, Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal
At: Building C8, room 8.2.38
[2024-03-05] 11:00

In the realm of photonics, the manipulation of light's inherent properties through spatial and temporal shaping represents a frontier of scientific exploration with profound technological implications. Optical modes define the intensity, temporal, frequency and polarization structure of an electromagnetic wave. All these modes correspond to distinct degrees of freedom of light allowing to structure light in many dimensions. Tailored light fields finds applications across the entire spectrum of optics: generating classical and quantum states of light, harnessing linear and nonlinear light-matter interactions, and advancing applications in microscopy, spectroscopy, holography, and communications. This seminar delves into the latest advancements in shaping light across its multifaceted degrees of freedom, encompassing the generation of complex light patterns via structured light using metamaterials and the exploration of solitary wave phenomena and frequency combs through nonlinear dynamics in semiconductor lasers.