Our panel of editors reviewed more than 160 research summaries from scientists all over the globe. They selected for publication 30 stories that they felt most clearly communicated breakthroughs of interest to the optics community. Some of the summaries have related multimedia. Thanks to all who submitted summaries, as well as to our panel of guest editors: Robert D. Guenther, the panel chair, and guest editors Mihaela Dinu, Dmitry Dylov, Alexandre Fong, Andrew Forbes, Nicholas J. Frigo, G. Groot Gregory, Brooke Hester, Bob Jopson, Nick Lambert, Arlene Smith, Yanina Shevchenko, Zuleykhan Tomova and Stephen R. Wilk.
Metamaterials
Optimized environments for novel optical manipulation
Lasers
Near-thresholdless and chaotic approaches to laser systems
Imaging
Improved subject identification—from coalescing photon pairs to face recognition
Particle Diagnostics
Singular, self-bending beams for microparticle control
Guided Waves
Nanowaveguide surface effects, microring resonators and all-fiber optical memory
Microscopy
Holographic and laser-induced electron diffraction microscopy
Optomechanics
Nanoscale traveling-wave and active-cavity laser optomechanics
Beam Shaping and Optical Control
Elegant Gaussian beams and phased-array optical antennas
for micromanipulation
Ultrafast Optics
Capturing flying photons and temporal tweezing of light
Nano-Optics
Biomimetic surfaces, lasing microspheres, sensors and mass-spectral imaging on the nanoscale
Mathematical Photonics
Subwavelength topological states and the evolution of many-body systems
Nonlinear Optics
Inverse four-wave mixing in optical fiber