Efficient and functional optical frequency conversion in 3D Nonlinear Optical Artificial Materials

Introduction

Optical frequency conversion in bulk nonlinear crystals is used for generation of coherent light over the entire optical regime from extreme ultra-violet up to THz waves. This remarkable ability is at the core of a plethora of important technological and scientific applications.

Limitations of Bulk Nonlinear Crystals

However, bulk nonlinear crystals pose strong limitations on integration, miniaturization, and control over the nonlinear interactions, holding back the further progress of optical frequency conversion technologies.

Proposed Breakthrough

I propose to lead a great breakthrough in the field by developing a new kind of 3D nano-engineered nonlinear optical artificial materials with superior nonlinear optical properties, and free of the limitations of bulk nonlinear crystals.

Inspiration from Nonlinear Metasurfaces

These materials will be inspired by recently developed nonlinear metasurfaces. It was demonstrated that nonlinear metasurfaces exhibit unprecedented nonlinear functionalities, and effective nonlinearities exceeding by far those of bulk nonlinear crystals, promising to replace bulk crystals in future nonlinear optical technologies.

Challenges with Current Designs

However, their two-dimensional designs and nanoscale thickness strongly limit their frequency conversion efficiency, with no existing practical nanofabrication approach nor theoretical proposition to overcome this limitation.

Research Goals

Our research aims to close this gap. We will:

1. Develop a new nanofabrication methodology that will allow stacking hundreds of nonlinear metasurfaces into a 3D nonlinear material in a technologically viable way.
2. Study new fundamental nonlinear interactions in these novel nonlinear materials.
3. Demonstrate experimentally their superiority over bulk nonlinear crystals in conversion efficiency and functionalities.

Potential Impact

These achievements will potentially pave the way to the next era of nonlinear optical frequency conversion technologies. They will also immediately impact applications of 3D nanostructured optical materials in general, as well as may change the way we think about 3D nanofabrication.