New waves with picometer-scale spatial variations of electromagnetic fields can be seen in the picture. The research team's findings were published in the journal Physical Review Applied.
Micro is a million times smaller than a meter and it's the origin of the word. Jacob says that their work is for light matter interaction within the picoscopic regime which is far smaller.
Natural media hosts a variety of light-matter interaction phenomena. The use of Picophotonic waves in semiconducting materials could lead to the creation of functional optical devices.
Light-matter interaction in materials is central to many of the devices that use light-matter. The study of how light flows on the nanometer scale in engineered structures has led to important advances over the past ten years. Classical theory of atomic matter is where this existing research can be found. A quantum theory of atomistic response in matter was used to make the current finding. The team consists of Jacob and two other people.
There is a missing link between atomic lattices, their symmetries and the role they play in light fields. The theory team came up with a framework of matter and a theory of light in materials.
Jacob says that this is a major shift from the classical treatment of light flow. The emergence of Picophotonics phenomena can be traced back to the quantum nature of light.
New waves emerge in the atomic lattice when the traditional waves are not present. Light waves are highly variable even within a single building block of the Silicon crystal.
Light is influenced by the symmetries of natural materials. The next goal is to apply our theory to a lot of materials and see if there are new waves.
Jacob says that the group has been leading the frontier of research on the field. The network is bringing together diverse researchers to explore macroscopic phenomena stemming from the tiny particles inside matter.
More information can be found in the Physical Review Applied. There is a book titled "PhysRevApplied.18.044065."
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