From science fiction death rays to supermarket scanners, lasers have become deeply embedded in our daily lives and our culture. But in recent decades the standard laser beam has evolved into an array of more specialized light beams with a variety of strange and counterintuitive properties. Some of them have the ability to reconstruct themselves after disruption by an obstacle, while others can bend in complicated shapes or rotate like a corkscrew. These unusual optical effects open new and exciting possibilities for science and technology. For example, they make possible microscopic tractor beams that pull objects toward the source of the light, and they allow the trapping and manipulation of individual molecules to construct specially-tailored nanostructures for engineering or medical use. It has even been found that beams of light can produce lines of darkness that can be tied in knots. This book is an introductory survey of these specialized light beams and their scientific applications, at a level suitable for undergraduates with a basic knowledge of optics and quantum mechanics. It provides a unified treatment of the subject, collecting together in textbook form for the first time many topics currently found only in the original research literature.

This book provides an introduction to quantum cascade lasers, including the basic underlying models used to describe the device. It aims at giving a synthetic view of the topic including the aspects of the physics, the technology, and the use of the device. It should also provide a guide for the application engineer to use this device in systems. The book is based on lecture notes of a class given for Masters and beginning PhD students. The idea is to provide an introduction to the new and exciting developments that intersubband transitions have brought to the use of the mid-infrared and terahertz region of the electromagnetic spectrum. The book provides an introductory part to each topic so that it can be used in a self-contained way, while references to the literature will allow deeper studies for further research.

Lasers can alter the surface composition and properties of materials in a highly controllable way, which makes them efficient and cost-effective tools for surface engineering. This book provides an overview of the different techniques, the laser-material interactions and the advantages and disadvantages for different applications. Part one looks at laser heat treatment, part two covers laser additive manufacturing such as laser-enhanced electroplating, and part three discusses laser micromachining, structuring and surface modification. Chemical and biological applications of laser surface engineering are explored in part four, including ways to improve the surface corrosion properties of metals.

Laser Scanning devices (LADAR for Laser Detection and Ranging) are used in construction projects to capture as-built data. They can rapidly generate large unstructured point clouds. This study describes an experiment in which an I-beam on a concrete floor surface is scanned, and the resulting point cloud data used to calculate its pose. Two approaches for segmenting potential target objects are described. Principal axis analysis is used to determine the pose of the I-beam. Bounding boxes are then formed around it and compared to an ideal bounding box generated from the known geometric specifications of the I-beam of interest. A separate laserbased site measurement system (SMS) was used to measure points on the Ibeams to form reference data for estimating the closeness of fit of computed pose of the I-beam to measured pose of the I-beam. Three spheres were used as a means of registering the scan and SMS axes.

The processing of signals or data is one of the cores of the information chain from production to application. More and more signals should be processed digitally in the big data era. Rapid and massive advances in digital signal processing (DSP) technology have been achieved over the past several decades. DSP technology revolutionized the electronics and opto-electronics industries. DSP technology is almost an all-embracing field and is advancing with each passing day. The classical application areas of DSP such as telecommunications, speech and image processing continue to be the main contributor to its growth. This book compiles cutting-edge research in several elementary and advanced topics in DSP, focusing on areas such as filter design algorithms, hardware/software techniques, and their applications. This book has a special emphasis on the modeling and design of optical communication filters. Use of well-developed DSP techniques and algorithms to design the wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) devices is a wise use of existing technology. The authors also share several of their thoughts concerning the practical DSP systems. The DSP theory and hardware for obscured object identification, and its applications in the intelligent baggage scanners are introduced systematically. This book will be helpful for students, researchers and engineers in the DSP fields to understand the basic knowledge and techniques of software, hardware, devices, and systems.

This book provides detailed and current information on using fullerenes (bucky-balls) in photodynamic therapy (PDT), one of the most actively studied applications of photonic science in healthcare. This will serve as a useful source for researchers working in photomedicine and nanomedicine, especially those who are investigating PDT for cancer treatment and infectious disease treatment. The book runs the gamut from an introduction to the history and chemistry of fullerenes and some basic photochemistry, to the application of fullerenes as photosensitizers for cancer and antimicrobial inactivation.

Pathogens such as viruses and bacteria are among the greatest threats to human health worldwide. In today's era of population growth and international travel, new technologies are desperately needed to combat the spread of known and emerging pathogens. This book presents a new concept for pathogen inactivation called selective photonic disinfection (SEPHODIS). The SEPHODIS technology inactivates pathogens by mechanical means, a total paradigm shift from traditional chemical and physical methods. The unique strength of SEPHODIS resides in its capability to inactivate pathogens while preserving desirable materials such as human cells and proteins. The technology also avoids the need to use chemicals, drastically reducing the risk of side effects. These properties make SEPHODIS ideal for important biomedical applications such as safeguarding blood products and therapeutics against pathogens, as well as producing effective and safe vaccines to combat infectious disease. Written in a style that is both technically informative and easy to comprehend for the layman reader, this book illustrates the story of SEPHODIS from its initial discovery and bench studies to its real-world applications.

Rolf T. Borlinghaus erlautert die Ursachen fur die klassische Begrenzung der Lichtmikroskopie und beleuchtet die neuen Super-Hochaufloesungstechniken. Dies ist besonders aktuell, da der Nobelpreis 2014 fur Chemie fur die Entwicklung von Technologien vergeben wurde, die es nun ermoeglichen, mit Lichtmikroskopen feinere Details aufzuloesen, als es die klassische Theorie einschrankend vorhersagt. Diese neuen Methoden stellen aber nicht das bisherige Weltbild der Optik in Frage, vielmehr nutzen sie ganz andere Phanomene, um mittels klassischer Optik Positionsbestimmungen von Molekulen durchzufuhren. Das ist theoretisch beliebig genau moeglich.

Materials and Reliability Handbook for Semiconductor Optical and Electron Devices provides comprehensive coverage of reliability procedures and approaches for electron and photonic devices. These include lasers and high speed electronics used in cell phones, satellites, data transmission systems and displays. Lifetime predictions for compound semiconductor devices are notoriously inaccurate due to the absence of standard protocols. Manufacturers have relied on extrapolation back to room temperature of accelerated testing at elevated temperature. This technique fails for scaled, high current density devices. Device failure is driven by electric field or current mechanisms or low activation energy processes that are masked by other mechanisms at high temperature. The Handbook addresses reliability engineering for III-V devices, including materials and electrical characterization, reliability testing, and electronic characterization. These are used to develop new simulation technologies for device operation and reliability, which allow accurate prediction of reliability as well as the design specifically for improved reliability. The Handbook emphasizes physical mechanisms rather than an electrical definition of reliability. Accelerated aging is useful only if the failure mechanism is known. The Handbook also focuses on voltage and current acceleration stress mechanisms.

Optical Spectroscopy is an interdisciplinary science dedicated to generating and building knowledge in the field of spectroscopy and as a tool for practical investigations. This book has been elaborated for the use of specialists, students and young scientists interested in material characterization and direct investigation of various technological processes. As the title shows, the project of this book is ambitious and challenging. The topics have been selected to supply the physical background needed to understand the main spectroscopic principles and, at the same time, to reveal new potentiality for applications. Subjects like Reflectance Spectroscopy, Infrared Attenuated Total Reflection or Photoreflectance Spectroscopy provide an overview of classical methods in spectroscopy in contexts of new applications and reveal possibilities in new domains such as medicine, environmental investigations, etc. Various spectroscopic measurement methods embedded in characterization of materials, devices or technological processes are extensively presented.

A seminal early text on lenticular and holographic imaging, Takanori Okoshi's "Three-Dimensional Imaging Techniques" provides analysis and insights into the fundamentals of 3-D perception and the creation of 3-D imagery as well as a history of its technological development.