November 2014 Issue
Feature Articles
Perovskite Photovoltaics: Hitting Their Stride
Researchers are finding new uses for an old material in photovoltaics. But can they engineer perovskite into a solar cell that’s better than the current state-of-the-art?
by Lynn SavageNegawatts: Optics, Photonics and Energy Savings
Five scientists survey the potential energy savings that could flow from selected optical technologies, ranging from optical data interconnects to photonic gas sensors.
by Edited by Keith GoossenExoplanets: Getting a Closer Look
Sophisticated new techniques are directly imaging giant planets outside of our solar system and recording spectra that reveal the composition of their atmospheres. And telescopes capable of directly imaging Earth-sized exoplanets are on the technological horizon.
by Jeff HechtPlasmonics: The Rise of Quantum Effects
The emerging discipline of quantum plasmonics, which promises new applications and approaches in quantum information systems, formed the topic of a recent OSA Incubator Meeting.
by Garnett W. Bryant, Edo Waks and Joachim R. KrennDepartments and Columns
Scatterings News
Headliners, policy news, industry updates and book reviews.
The Fractal Nature of Innovation
How do patents fill an intellectual property space?
Building Freestanding Elastomeric Waveguides: Exploring an Emerging Field
Flexible, reconfigurable elastomeric materials offer new possibilities for optics applications. Here, we discuss the emergence of elastomeric optics and two methods for creating freestanding elastomeric waveguides.
Harnessing the Potential of Compressive Sensing
Q&A with Abhijit Mahalanobis of Lockheed Martin and Mark Neifeld from the University of Arizona, USA, hosts of the OSA Incubator Meeting “Implications of Compressive Sensing Concepts to Imaging Systems.”
An Open Letter to the U.S. State Department
U.S. policy on immigration and student/scholar visas unfairly discriminates against scientists from selected countries such as Iran.
