This volume presents the Proceedings of New Development in Optics and Related Fields, held in Erice, Sicily, Italy, from the 6th to the 21st of June, 2005. This meeting was organized by the International School of Atomic and Molecular Spectroscopy of the Ettore Majorana Center for Scientific Culture. The purpose of this Institute was to provide a comprehensive and coherent treatment of the new techniques and contemporary developments in optics and related fields. Several lectures of the course addressed directly the technologies required for the detection and identification of chemical and biological threats; other lectures considered the possible applications of new techniques and materials to the detection and identification of such threats. Each lecturer developed a coherent section of the program starting at a somewhat fundamental level and ultimately reaching the frontier of knowledge in the field in a systematic and didactic fashion.

The contributions in this volume were presented at a NATO Advanced Study Institute held in Erice, Italy, 4-19 July 2013. Many aspects of important research into nanophotonics, plasmonics, semiconductor materials and devices, instrumentation for bio sensing to name just a few, are covered in depth in this volume. The growing connection between optics and electronics, due to the increasing important role plaid by semiconductor materials and devices, find their expression in the term photonics, which also reflects the importance of the photon aspect of light in the description of the performance of several optical systems. Nano-structures have unique capabilities that allow the enhanced performance of processes of interest in optical and photonic devices. In particular these structures permit the nanoscale manipulation of photons, electrons and atoms; they represent a very hot topic of research and are relevant to many devices and applications.
The various subjects bridge over the disciplines of physics, biology and chemistry, making this volume of interest to people working in these fields. The emphasis is on the principles behind each technique and on examining the full potential of each technique."

Advanced spectroscopic techniques allow the probing of very small systems and very fast phenomena, conditions that can be considered "extreme" at the present status of our experimentation and knowledge. Quantum dots, nanocrystals and single molecules are examples of the former and events on the femtosecond scale examples of the latter. The purpose of this book is to examine the realm of phenomena of such extreme type and the techniques that permit their investigations.

Each author has developed a coherent section of the program

starting at a somewhat fundamental level and ultimately reaching the frontier of knowledge in the field in a systematic and didactic fashion. The formal lectures are complemented by additional seminars.

This book presents an account of the course "Advances in Nonradiative Processes in Solids" held in Erice, Italy, from June 15 to 29, 1989. This meeting was organized by the International School of Atomic and Molecular Spectroscopy of the "Ettore Majorana" Centre for Scientific Culture. An area of solid state research that continues to attract the attention of experimental and theoretical physicists is that of nonradiative relaxation processes of excited solids. The interest in these processes stems from their technological relevance, and from the difficulty in the quantitative characterization and differentiation of their various pathways. The decay channels leading to the ground state include the conversion of electronic excitation energy into phonon energy, nonradiative transfer of excitation energy, upconversion processes, etc. Considerable advances have been achieved in understanding and modeling the radiative process that follow the electronic excitations of solids; the progress in this field has been instrumental in the development of new solid-state devices and laser materials. On the other hand, these advances have underscored the inadequacy in the understanding of the nonradiative relaxation processes. This course dealt with the advances in physical modeling, mathematical formalisms and experimental techniques relevant to the quantitative characterization of the various pathways of nonradiative relaxation of solids in excited electronic states.

This report presents an account of the course "Nonlinear Spectroscopy of Solids: Advances and Applications" held in Erice, Italy, from June 16 to 30, 1993. This meeting was organized by the International School of Atomic and Molecular Spectroscopy of the "Ettore Majorana" Centre for Scientific Culture. The purpose of this course was to present and discuss physical models, mathematical formalisms, experimental techniques, and applications relevant to the subject of nonlinear spectroscopy of solid state materials. The universal availability and application of lasers in spectroscopy has led to the widespread observation of nonlinear effects in the spectroscopy of materials. Nonlinear spectroscopy encompasses many physical phenomena which have their origin in the monochromaticity, spectral brightness, coherence, power density and tunability of laser sources. Conventional spectroscopy assumes a linear dependence between the applied electromagnetic field and the induced polarization of atoms and molecules. The validity of this assumption rests on the fact that even the most powerful conventional sources of light produce a light intensity which is not strong enough to equalize the rate of stimulated emission and that of the experimentally observed decay. A different situation may arise when laser light sources are used, particularly pulsed lasers. The use of such light sources can make the probability of induced emission comparable to, or even greater than, the probability of the observed decay; in such cases the nonlinearity of the response of the system is revealed by the experimental data and new properties, not detectable by conventional spectroscopy, will emerge.

Nanometer scale physics is progressing rapidly: the top-down approach of semiconductor technology will soon encounter the scale of the bottom-up approaches of supramolecular chemistry and spatially localized excitations in ionic crystals. Advances in this area have already led to applications in optoelectronics. More may be expected.

This book deals with the role of structure confinement in the spectroscopic characteristics of physical systems. It examines the fabrication, measurement and understanding of the relevant structures. It reports progress in the theory and in experimental techniques, starting with the consideration of fundamental principles and leading to the frontiers of research. The subjects dealt with include such spatially resolved structures as quantum wells, quantum wires, quantum dots, and luminescence, in both theoretical and practical terms.

The topics treated in this book are essentially those that a graduate student of physics or electrical engineering should be familiar with in classical electromagnetism. Each topic is analyzed in detail, and each new concept is explained with examples.The text is self-contained and oriented toward the student. It is concise and yet very detailed in mathematical calculations; the equations are explicitly derived, which is of great help to students and allows them to concentrate more on the physics concepts, rather than spending too much time on mathematical derivations. The introduction of the theory of special relativity is always a challenge in teaching electromagnetism, and this topic is considered with particular care. A large number of exercises are included.

Nonlinear Optics and Collective Excitations; N. Bloembergen. Fundamentals of Spectroscopy of Collective Excitations in Solids; B. Di Bartolo. Light-Matter Interaction: Experimental Aspects; C. Klingshirn. Theoretical Description of Collective Excitations: Bloch Equations and Relaxation Mechanisms; R. Zimmerman. Linear and Nonlinear Optical Spectroscopy: Spectral, Temporal and Spatial Resolution; J.M. Hvam. The Study of Collective Excitations in Solids by Inelastic Neutron Scattering: T. Riste. Excitation Dynamics in Organic Molecules, Solids, Fullerenes, and Polymers; P. Prasad. The IR Vibrational Properties of Composite Solids and Particles: The Lyddane-Sachs-Teller Relation Revisited; A.J. Sievers. Intrinsic Localized Modes in Anharmonic Lattices; A.J. Sievers, et al. Plasmons and Surface Plasmons in Bulk Metals, Metallic Clusters, and Metallic Heterostructures; R.V. Baltz. Enlightenment of Luminescent Materials; C.R. Ronda. Spectroscopy and Development of Solid Sate Layers at NASA; N.P. Barnes. Optical Excitation and Relaxation of Solids with Defects; B. Baldacchini. Newly Developed Solid State Lasers; R. Reisfeld. Energy Transfer and Migration of Excitation in Solids and Confined Structures; F. Auzel. 45 Additional Articles. Index.

This book provides a comprehensive treatment of the two fundamental aspects of a solid that determine its physical properties: lattice structure and atomic vibrations (phonons). The elements of group theory are extensively developed and used as a tool to show how the symmetry of a solid and the vibrations of the atoms in the solid lead to the physical properties of the material. The uses of different types of spectroscopy techniques that elucidate the lattice structure of a solid and the normal vibrational modes of the atoms in the solid are described. The interaction of light with solids (optical spectroscopy) is described in detail including how lattice symmetry and phonons affect the spectral properties and how spectral properties provide information about the material's symmetry and normal modes of lattice vibrations. The effects of point defects (doping) on the lattice symmetry and atomic vibrations and thus the spectral properties are discussed and used to show how material symmetry and lattice vibrations are critical in determining the properties of solid state lasers.

The book gives a comprehensive introduction to nano-optics The book is of interest to physicists, biologists and chemists The book may suggest directions to doctoral thesis investigations This volume presents a considerable number of interrelated contributions dealing with the new scientific ability to shape and control matter and electromagnetic fields on a sub-wavelength scale. The topics range from the fundamental ones, such as photonic metamateriials, plasmonics and sub-wavelength resolution to the more applicative, such as detection of single molecules, tomography on a micro-chip, fluorescence spectroscopy of biological systems, coherent control of biomolecules, biosensing of single proteins, terahertz spectroscopy of nanoparticles, rare earth ion-doped nanoparticles, random lasing, and nanocoax array architecture. The various subjects bridge over the disciplines of physics, biology and chemistry, making this volume of interest to people working in these fields. The emphasis is on the principles behind each technique and on examining the full potential of each technique. The contributions that appear in this volume were presented at a NATO Advanced Study Institute that was held in Erice, Italy, 3-18 July, 2011. The pedagogical aspect of the Institute is reflected in the topics presented in this volume.

The Nature of the Electronic Excited States of Molecular Systems; B. Di Bartolo. Properties of the Excited States of Complex Molecules; J. Reuss. Rate of Processes Involving Excited States; A.M. Stoneham. Excited States in Semiconductors; C. Klingshirn. Advances in the Characterization of Excited States of Luminescent Ions; G.F. Imbusch. Relaxed Excited States of Color Centers; G. Baldacchini. Properties of Highly Populated Excited States in Solids; F. Auzel. Advances in the Sensitization of Phosphors; B. Smets. Laser Spectroscopy inside Inhomogeneously Broadened Lines; M. MacFarlane. Excited-State Dynamics and Energy Transfer in Doped-Substituted Garnets; A. Brenier, et al. Studies of the Charge Transfer States of Certain Rare-Earth Activators in Yitrium and Lanthanum Oxysulfides; C.W. Struck, W.H. Fonger. The Jahn-Teller Effect in the Optical Spectra of Impurities; G. Viliani. 42 additional articles. Index.

Luminescence is presently, and will continue to be, a challenging field of research in materials science, solid-state physics and chemistry. Recent progress in optoelectronic and display technology continues to drive this field in the search for new luminescent materials. Demands on new procedures for synthesis, and understanding underlying luminescence processes in these materials, will create new opportunities for both fundamental and applied research. This book is a compilation of papers, both invited and solicted, from around the world that focus on luminescence and luminescent materials - from theory and modeling, characterization of luminescent materials, and systems with confined structures such as nanocrystallites and quantum wells and dots, to synthesis and device applications.

The topics treated in this book are essentially those that a graduate student of physics or electrical engineering should be familiar with in classical electromagnetism. Each topic is analyzed in detail, and each new concept is explained with examples.The text is self-contained and oriented toward the student. It is concise and yet very detailed in mathematical calculations; the equations are explicitly derived, which is of great help to students and allows them to concentrate more on the physics concepts, rather than spending too much time on mathematical derivations. The introduction of the theory of special relativity is always a challenge in teaching electromagnetism, and this topic is considered with particular care. A large number of exercises are included.