PHOTONICS

It was the development of the laser in the 1960’s and of the low-loss optical fibers that placed Optics at the center of the next technological revolution, and opened the door of a new age in technology: the age of Photonics.

 

The inventions of the laser and optical fibers have meant for Optics what the invention of the transistor and integrated circuits have meant for Electronics. Indeed, the invention of the transistor in 1948 has paved the way for the microelectronics industry and thus has opened the door to the computer age, making electronics a pervasive presence and changing our lives in more ways than one could have predicted or even imagined. In much the same way, the invention of the laser, coupled with the development of low-loss optical fibers, has ignited an explosion in the field of optical communication, and, along the way, has created more and far-reaching applications for light than anyone could have imagined.

 

The word Photonics was coined in the late 1960’s to describe a research field whose primary goal at the time was to use light (either visible or infrared) to performs functions that traditionally used to fall within the typical domain of electronics, such as telecommunications, remote sensing, control, information processing and the like. Since light is made up of photons – the fundamental particle of light and a fundamental building block of the universe – the word photonics was born, in a similar way that the word “electronics” is derived from electron, the fundamental particle and quanta of electric charge. At a component and system level then, photonics describes components and systems that operate with photons –particles of light- much in the same way that the word “electronics” describes components and systems that operate with electrons.

 

One should note that photonics is not a technology to (completely) replace electronics; rather, the two work hand-in-hand: photonics benefits greatly from the advancements in electronics, and electronics growth along with photonics. In fact, there is a significant and increasing overlap between the two fields, in what traditionally has been called opto-electronics. The sophisticated combination of light and electricity has created synergies that no one could have envisioned when the term photonics was coined. There is also no clear-cut distinction between the terms Optics, Photonics, and Optoelectronics, in their most general sense, particularly at the applications level. Increasingly, the word photonics is used where traditionally the terms Optics and/or Optoelectronics have been used in the past.

 

According to the Photonics Dictionary, published by Laurin Publishing – an authoritative source in the field – “Photonics is the technology of generating and harnessing light and other forms of radiant energy whose quantum unit is the photon. The science includes light emission, transmission, deflection, amplification and detection by lasers and other light sources, optical components and instruments, fiber optics, electro-optical instrumentation, related hardware and electronics, and sophisticated systems. The range of applications of photonics extends from energy generation to detection to communications and information processing.”

 

Many science fields come together in conceiving, designing, developing and bringing into being the materials, devices and systems able to perform the functions described in the above definition of photonics. As such, photonics is an interdisciplinary field across such diverse fields as optics, physics, electrical engineering, chemistry, materials science, and more. If one adds the actualapplications of photonics, the field touches practically every aspect of human life, and the possibilities for growth are endless.