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Aug 18, 2023

Photonics Spectra Preview for October 2023

AI for Optics Production The trends in manufacturing of photonic systems are well known: Miniaturize and integrate components, and scale-up batch sizes. Automated manufacturing with zero-defect

AI for Optics Production

The trends in manufacturing of photonic systems are well known: Miniaturize and integrate components, and scale-up batch sizes. Automated manufacturing with zero-defect production or full traceability is another key trend. This calls for a detect/predict/prevent/repair approach with a comprehensive sensor network to observe every step in the production chain plus complex software to make use of such data. Contributing editor Andreas Thoss explores how artificial Intelligence is increasingly being employed to succeed at this challenge.Key Technologies: Optics fabrication, inspection, and quality control - particularly in the context of automation. QCLs, fiber-coupled high laser diodesPhotonic Technology for Water MonitoringContributing editor James Schlett surveys the latest developments in photonic technology for water monitoring applications. Key questions include:• What optical techniques are used to reveal the different contaminants in our water?• Which photonic techniques excel at detecting which type of contaminant?• What performance thresholds define the current state of the art?• What performance parameters do those who test and monitor water want in the next generation of photonic analytical instruments?Key Technologies: Conventional absorption/fluorescence spectroscopy, including UV instruments and tools employing microfluidic and chromatography techniques. QCLs for mid-IR techniquesOn-Chip Supercontinuum LasersSupercontinuum sources are key-enablers to advance industrial applications - such as optical coherence tomography (OCT), hyperspectral light detection and ranging (LiDAR), or frequency-comb generation. Yet, supercontinuum generation (SCG) to date is notoriously inefficient, and the so-called high spectral power range where the spectral power is concentrated, is typically quite narrow.Menlo Systems and Superlight Photonics discuss a new approach to SCG, based on so-called dispersion-patterned waveguide chips, drastically reduces pump laser power requirements while also exhibiting enhancement of the spectral power range up to almost 3000 times vs alternative state-of-the-art SCG methods. Further, because the mass-producible dispersion-patterned waveguides are based on a CMOS-compatible silicon nitride platform, there is potential for the technology to become a fully integrated chip-based solution in the very near future.