The recent explosion
of optical tweezers
research is unlikely to
slow down as more
and more physicists
move into inter-
disciplinary fields.
[ COVER STORY ]
20 Forty Years of Optical Manipulation
Over the past 40 years, optical manipulation research has deepened our
understanding of physics and biology, and it has yielded the optical-
tweezers technique that is used across all the sciences.
David McGloin and Jonathan P. Reid
28 Lasers in Communications
Low-cost semiconductor lasers power the shortest networks in the data
center and the long-haul links that speed information around the globe.
Today, lasers are integrated into photonic circuitry and even optical cables.
Patricia Daukantas
COVER: Artist’s interpretation
of a DNA strand held under
tension by two beads
trapped in optical tweezers.
Illustration by John Newhart.
This page: A purple laser beam
slows erbium atoms emerging
from an oven at 1,300° C, in
preparation for trapping and
cooling. NIST photo.
34 Hermann von Helmholtz: A 19th Century Renaissance Man
Hermann von Helmholtz was many things to many people: physicist, teacher,
medical doctor, aesthete and more. He drew on his extensive knowledge
of many fields to invent the ophthalmoscope—a device that revolutionized
ophthalmology—when he was just 29 years old.
Barry R. Masters
40 The Promise of Diffractive Waveplates
Diffractive waveplates exhibit the high diffraction efficiency of Bragg gratings in
micron-thick material layers.
