[신간의 별자리x] 우리/미술, 그리고 ‘슬픔의 박물관’

On September 14, 2015 at 09:50:45 UTC the two detectors of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory simultaneously observed a transient gravitational-wave signal. The signal sweeps upwards in frequency from 35 to 250 Hz with a peak gravitational-wave strain of 1.0×10(-21). It matches the waveform predicted by general relativity for the inspiral and merger of a pair of black holes and the ringdown of the resulting single black hole. The signal was observed with a matched-filter signal-to-noise ratio of 24 and a false alarm rate estimated to be less than 1 event per 203,000 years, equivalent to a significance greater than 5.1σ. The source lies at a luminosity distance of 410(-180)(+160)  Mpc corresponding to a redshift z=0.09(-0.04)(+0.03). In the source frame, the initial black hole masses are 36(-4)(+5)M⊙ and 29(-4)(+4)M⊙, and the final black hole mass is 62(-4)(+4)M⊙, with 3.0(-0.5)(+0.5)M⊙c(2) radiated in gravitational waves. All uncertainties define 90% credible intervals. These observations demonstrate the existence of binary stellar-mass black hole systems. This is the first direct detection of gravitational waves and the first observation of a binary black hole merger.

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The Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger

The burgeoning field of nanophotonics has grown to be a major research area, primarily because of the ability to control and manipulate single quantum systems (emitters) and single photons on demand For many years studying nanophotonic phenomena was limited to traditional semiconductors (including silicon and GaAs) and experiments were carried out predominantly at cryogenic temperatures In the last decade, however, diamond has emerged as a new contender to study photonic phenomena at the nanoscale Offering plethora of quantum emitters that are optically active at room temperature and ambient conditions, diamond has been exploited to demonstrate super-resolution microscopy and realize entanglement, Purcell enhancement and other quantum and classical nanophotonic effects Elucidating the importance of diamond as a material, this review will highlight the recent achievements in the field of diamond nanophotonics, and convey a roadmap for future experiments and technological advancements

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Diamond Nanophotonics

In this paper, we review the developments of crystalline Raman lasers over the past five years. Average powers exceeding 5 W and pulse energies above 1 J in the near infrared have been demonstrated for larger scale devices. There has been a rapid development of all-solid-state sources based on the standard diode-pumped lasers, especially intracavity crystalline Raman lasers, which offer wavelength versatility at high conversion efficiencies (overall diode Stokes optical conversion efficiencies up to 17%) in the near infrared, including the 1.5- mum eye-safe band. Passively Q-switched intracavity Raman lasers based on self-Raman laser materials offer many advantages for miniaturization of short-pulse (1 ns) sources. Intracavity frequency-doubled crystalline Raman lasers have also emerged as practical and versatile sources in the yellow orange region at 1-W power levels with diode-visible efficiencies near 10%. Recent developments of all-solid-state continuous-wave (CW) intracavity crystalline Raman lasers offer many possibilities for the future: intracavity frequency doubling has already resulted in the demonstration of CW visible sources with powers approaching 1 W at 5% diode-visible efficiency.

Crystalline Raman lasers

Synthetic single-crystal diamond has recently emerged as a promising platform for Raman lasers at exotic wavelengths due to its giant Raman shift, large transparency window, and excellent thermal properties yielding a greatly enhanced figure of merit compared to conventional materials. To date, diamond Raman lasers have been realized using bulk plates placed inside macroscopic cavities, requiring careful alignment and resulting in high threshold powers (W–kW range). Here we demonstrate an on-chip Raman laser based on fully integrated, high-quality-factor, diamond racetrack microresonators embedded in silica. Pumping at telecom wavelengths, we show Stokes output discretely tunable over a ∼100  nm bandwidth around 2 μm with output power >250 μW, extending the functionality of diamond Raman lasers to an interesting wavelength range at the edge of the mid-infrared spectrum. Continuous-wave operation with only ∼85  mW pump threshold power in the feeding waveguide is demonstrated along with continuous, mode-hop-free tuning over ∼7.5  GHz in a compact, integrated-optics platform.

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On-chip diamond Raman laser

Stimulated Brillouin scattering materials, experimental design and applications: A review

Efficient Raman frequency conversion of high‐power fiber lasers in diamond

We demonstrate continuous-wave (cw) operation of a diamond Raman laser at 1240 nm in an external cavity configuration. The output power increased linearly with pump power with a 49.7% slope efficiency and reached 10.1 W at the maximum available pump power of 31 W. The combination of resonator design with diamond provides a novel approach to power-scalable cw wavelength and beam conversion.

Continuous-wave wavelength conversion for high-power applications using an external cavity diamond Raman laser

Quasi-cw pumping is used to investigate the high-power characteristics of cw beam conversion in diamond Raman lasers (DRLs). We show that thermal gradients establish in DRLs at approximately 50 μs for a 100 μm pump beam diameter, and thus that the steady state for cw operation can be reached within the 100–300 μs pulse duration of conventional quasi-cw pump laser technology. Using this approach, a steady-state on-time output power of 108 W was obtained from an external-cavity DRL during 250 μs pulses with 34% conversion efficiency. No thermal lens in the diamond was evident, showing excellent prospects for further power scaling.

Investigating diamond Raman lasers at the 100 W level using quasi-continuous-wave pumping.

A fundamental advantage of lasers is their ability to produce a large number of photons in a single optical mode, yet this is achieved in only a minor fraction of devices due to the instability mechanism called spatial hole burning. Here, we exploit the spatial hole burning free nature of a stimulated scattering gain medium to demonstrate single longitudinal mode (SLM) operation in a generic standing wave cavity. A continuous wave diamond Raman oscillator with multi-Watt-level output power and a frequency stability of 80 MHz is demonstrated without use of additional mode-selective elements. Mode stability is addressed by considering the coupling of the Stokes power with thermally induced optical path length changes in the gain medium. The results foreshadow a novel approach for greatly extending the power and wavelength range of SLM laser sources, and with potential advantages for achieving sub-Poissonian intensity noise and sub-Schawlow–Townes linewidths.

Ondrej Kitzler

Papers

Stimulated Brillouin scattering materials, experimental design and applications: A review

Efficient Raman frequency conversion of high‐power fiber lasers in diamond

Continuous-wave wavelength conversion for high-power applications using an external cavity diamond Raman laser

Investigating diamond Raman lasers at the 100 W level using quasi-continuous-wave pumping.

Intrinsically stable high-power single longitudinal mode laser using spatial hole burning free gain