AbstractsPhysics

Characterization of single emitters and nano-antennas

by A. Mohtashami




Institution: Universiteit van Amsterdam
Department:
Year: 2015
Record ID: 1263833
Full text PDF: http://hdl.handle.net/11245/1.442145


Abstract

A main promise of the field of physics called "nanophotonics" that deals with nanotechnology to control light, is to provide control over the emission of light sources. Recent developments in the field of solid state lighting that resulted in bright and efficient LEDs, as an example, rely directly upon our understanding of how to control the emission of light. On the other hand, scientific advances in the fields of super-resolution microscopy, optical and quantum information processing, cryptography and secure communication, significantly rely on advances in controlling the emission of single photons, the detection of single photons, and increasing the light-matter interaction strength between emitters and single photons. In all these applications, the main question is how to control the emission of light in terms of the rate at which the source emits, the direction into which it radiates, and the polarization in which the source emits a photon. In this thesis we address how to choose an efficient single photon emitter, how to characterize a nanophotonic structure which controls the rate and direction of the emitted light, and how to fully characterize the polarization of the emitted light.