Winter 1999
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A laser is really not much more than a flashlight that emits a highly concentrated form of light. But the special properties of laser light have made it an extremely important tool, both in everyday applications such as CD players and at the most exciting frontiers of scientific research. University of Oregon physicist Hailin Wang is researching microlasers so small they may someday be commonly found by the hundreds or thousands on tiny computer chips.
"Optics, the field for studying lasers, is now the cutting edge of technological advance in the area of computers and information processing," asserts Wang. He is a member of the Oregon Center for Optics, a group of UO researchers that explores lasers and related technologies.
"Electronics has been vastly important for the past four decades, but now we are developing a whole new set of technologies--photonics--that will take us far beyond the capabilities of elecronic devices. We want to control how electrons, the components of electricity, interact with photons, the components of light," Wang says. "We want to be able to put this interaction to use in photonic devices."
The devices Wang and other optics researchers are investigating are almost unimaginably small--small enough for dozens to fit on the head of a pin. One way to control photons is to use a tiny glass sphere about one-fifth the diameter of a human hair. Wang shoots photons into the sphere, where they exhibit the "whispering gallery effect." This effect is familiar to visitors of large rooms with rounded ceilings, such as the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol. Due to the shape of the room, a person's voice, even a whisper, is transmitted with very little loss of volume around the arc of the dome.
Inside Wang's glass bead, photons exhibiting this same effect circle around the edge of the sphere. The reflecting characteristics of the sphere also increase the ephemeral lifetime of the photon. By exploring how to control photons in space and time, Wang is developing techniques that will advance photonics still further.
"We want to get to a place where a single photon can make a very big difference," he says. "Computers will not always operate as they do now. A whole new class of photonic devices is emerging that will use optical switching and microlasers. Our work is helping lay the groundwork for those advances."
Hailin Wang came to the UO in 1995 from Bell Labs, one of the largest and most productive private research laboratories in the world.
"Oregon has an excellent optics program and I wanted to be part of it," he says.
He sees the creation of a critical mass of highly skilled researchers as one of the most important aspects of the Brain, Biology, and Machine Initiative (see "Taking the Initiative").
"Good people attract other good people. And when you have a lot of highly skilled researchers working together from the diversity of fields brought together by this initiative, they make exciting things happen. They make important advances."
These collaborations have a direct and important benefit on society, he notes.
"Researchers have an impressive track record for creating new and useful technology. In physics, our basic research has led to lasers, fiber optics, and super-sensitive sensors and detectors. A few of the practical applications of these advances are the Internet; laser surgery; and scanners used for warehouse inventories, the mail system, and even the supermarket checkout. Lasers have revolutionized the detection of minute amounts of pollutants or chemicals in our air and water.
"The Brain, Biology, and Machine Initiative supports the kind of research that made these advances possible," Wang says. "These are important advances for society, advances that have a big payoff."