Electrical Generation of Stationary Light in Random Scattering Media

In recent years there has been great interest in controlling the speed of propagation of electromagnetic waves. In gases and crystals, coherent techniques have been applied to alter the speed of light without changing the physical or chemical structure of the medium. Also, light transmitted by highly disordered solids has exhibited signatures of Anderson localization, indicating the existence of a regime of “stopped” light that is mediated by random elastic scattering. However, to date, light has not been generated in a random medium as a pointlike excitation that is fixed in space from the outset. Here we report experimental evidence for the electrical generation and confinement of light within nanosized volumes of a random dielectric scattering medium in which a population inversion has been established, and discuss the properties of these novel light sources.

[1]  P. Sheng,et al.  Introduction to Wave Scattering, Localization and Mesoscopic Phenomena. Second edition , 1995 .

[2]  S. John.  Electromagnetic absorption in a disordered medium near a photon mobility edge , 1984 .

[3]  Roberto Righini,et al.  Localization of light in a disordered medium , 1997, Nature.

[4]  García,et al.  Observation of photon localization in a three-dimensional disordered system. , 1991, Physical review letters.

[5]  A Z Genack,et al.  Photon localization in resonant media. , 2001, Physical review letters.

[6]  Philip W. Anderson,et al.  The question of classical localization A theory of white paint , 1985 .

[7]  S. Harris,et al.  Light speed reduction to 17 metres per second in an ultracold atomic gas , 1999, Nature.

[8]  Leung Tsang,et al.  Monte Carlo Simulations of the Extinction Rate of Densely Packed Spheres with Clustered and Nonclustered Geometries , 1995 .

[9]  P. Anderson.  Absence of Diffusion in Certain Random Lattices , 1958 .

[10]  Genack.  Optical transmission in disordered media. , 1987, Physical review letters.

[11]  Harris,et al.  Observation of electromagnetically induced transparency. , 1991, Physical review letters.

[12]  D. Wiersma,et al.  Experimental evidence for recurrent multiple scattering events of light in disordered media. , 1995, Physical review letters.

[13]  M S Shahriar,et al.  Observation of ultraslow and stored light pulses in a solid. , 2001, Physical review letters.

[14]  W. Welford.  Principles of optics (5th Edition): M. Born, E. Wolf Pergamon Press, Oxford, 1975, pp xxviii + 808, £9.50 , 1975 .

[15]  Stephen C. Rand,et al.  Laser action in strongly scattering rare-earth-metal-doped dielectric nanophosphors , 2001 .

[16]  Ch. M. Briskina,et al.  BRIEF COMMUNICATIONS: Luminescence and stimulated emission of neodymium in sodium lanthanum molybdate powders , 1986 .

[17]  A Z Genack,et al.  Spatial-field correlation: the building block of mesoscopic fluctuations. , 2002, Physical review letters.

[18]  Robert P. H. Chang,et al.  Random laser action in semiconductor powder , 1999 .

[19]  E. Wolf,et al.  Principles of Optics (7th Ed) , 1999 .

[20]  Ping Yuan,et al.  Observation of ultraslow light propagation in a ruby crystal at room temperature , 2005, SPIE/COS Photonics Asia.

[21]  Ray H. Baughman,et al.  Stimulated emission in high-gain organic media , 1999 .

[22]  M. Scully,et al.  Transporting and time reversing light via atomic coherence. , 2002, Physical review letters.

[23]  H. Arnoldus,et al.  Spatial separation of the traveling and evanescent parts of dipole radiation. , 2003, Optics letters.

[24]  N. Lawandy,et al.  Laser action in strongly scattering media , 1994, Nature.

[25]  Patrick Sebbah,et al.  Selective Excitation of Localized Modes in Active Random Media , 2001 .

[26]  J. Goodman.  Statistical Optics , 1985 .

[27]  García,et al.  Measurement of the transport mean free path of diffusing photons. , 1992, Physical review. B, Condensed matter.

[28]  Anirban Mitra,et al.  Random laser action in ZnO , 2000 .

[29]  C. Goutaudier,et al.  Optimization of spectroscopic properties of Yb3+-doped refractory sesquioxides: cubic and monoclinic Gd2O3 ☆ , 2001 .

[30]  Z. Dutton,et al.  Observation of coherent optical information storage in an atomic medium using halted light pulses , 2001, Nature.

[31]  Xunya Jiang,et al.  Transmission and reflection studies of periodic and random systems with gain , 1999 .

[32]  D. Wiersma,et al.  Near-field short range correlation in optical waves transmitted through random media. , 2003, Physical review letters.

[33]  Lee,et al.  Universal conductance fluctuations in metals. , 1985, Physical review letters.

[34]  Direct observation of locally enhanced electromagnetic field , 2000 .

[35]  N. Lawandy,et al.  Laser action in strongly scattering media , 1994, Nature.

[36]  M. Brereton.  Classical Electrodynamics (2nd edn) , 1976 .

[37]  R. Laine,et al.  Continuous-wave ultraviolet laser action in strongly scattering Nd-doped alumina. , 2002, Optics letters.

[38]  M D Lukin,et al.  Manipulating light pulses via dynamically controlled photonic band gap. , 2002, Physical review letters.

[39]  K. Kamiuto,et al.  Near-field scattering by a small spherical particle embedded in a nonabsorbing medium , 1984 .

[40]  S. D. Gupta,et al.  Reciprocity relations for reflected amplitudes. , 2002, Optics letters.