The University of Southampton

Published: 20 December 2019
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Physicists combined deep learning with nanophotonics in the new study

Physicists at the University of Southampton have taught an artificial neural network to develop an intuitive understanding of the flow of light in nanostructures.

The pioneering study opens new routes for nano-optical modelling at unprecedented speed, potentially enabling formerly impossible real-time performance of nanophotonic devices found in optical chips, metasurface flat lenses and quantum technology.

These applications offer optical properties 'on demand' but typically need to be designed in a process that requires time-consuming numerical simulations, taking hours or even days in complex systems. The new research, published this month in Nano Letters, demonstrates speeds that are thousands of times faster by making use of neural networks.

Lead author Dr Peter Wiecha, of Physics and Astronomy, says: "Deep learning neural networks can be trained to solve a wide range of situations by extracting some basic underlying rules. Here, we show for the first time that a neural network can be used to infer the precise flow of light at the nanoscale. This three-dimensional solving network is a ground-breaking demonstration of what deep learning can be capable to do in a scientific context."

The interactions of light with nanostructures are governed by a set of electromagnetic equations that are generally applicable from radio waves to light waves. These Maxwell's equations represent some of the most profound foundations of physics.

In their new work, the researchers showed that neural networks can be developed to learn the essential light-matter interactions resulting from Maxwell's equations and hence capture a much more generalised class of problems related to the electromagnetic fields inside the nano-optical devices. Knowledge of these fields in all three dimensions allowed researchers to reconstruct most of the characteristics of the light-matter interaction without any approximations.

Co-author Professor Otto Muskens, Leader of the Integrated Nanophotonics Group, says: "Manifold applications will arise from this work now we have proven that a neural network can learn the optical response in a generalised way. We believe that these ideas are very applicable to many other problems in physics. We are currently working on further generalising the neural network's understanding of light-matter interaction with the long term goal to reach an ultra-fast model, able to deal with multi-material systems, arbitrary illumination conditions and possibly large-area geometries such as entire photonic meta-surfaces."

The new study included the latest developments in deep learning neural networks to deal with the multi-dimensional and large data-sets. The neural network was run on a graphics processing unit (GPU), awarded by industry partner NVIDIA to the project. The lead author was supported by an international fellowship from the German Research Foundation (DFG).

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Published: 28 November 2019
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Dr Andrei Dragomir has dramatically reduced the size of a core component of quantum technology.

Physicists at the University of Southampton have developed a miniaturised cold atom system that will help unlock the commercial potential of quantum devices.

The vacuum chamber vastly reduces the size of a core component of quantum technology, opening new possibilities for the next generation of computing, sensing and communications applications.

Dr Andrei Dragomir, of the Quantum, Light and Matter (QLM) Group, is founding spinout company Aquark technologies to drive the technology forward.

Unlike modern electronics, which rely on the manipulation of electrons, quantum devices tap into the potential of new physics exploring tiny energy levels of atoms and sub-atomic particles.

"There has been a surge of investment in bringing these quantum technologies to market, however most of it is directed toward software development rather than hardware components," Andrei explains.

"Whilst these devices do perform better than their classical counterparts, they depend on cold atoms systems which occupy large spaces, are complex, power hungry and require expensive qualified personnel to operate them. This creates a tremendous engineering challenge for the commercial application of quantum devices and is the major obstacle preventing wider adoption."

After years of research, Southampton physicists have transformed the current complex, power-intensive systems into the miniaturised vacuum chamber which can accomplish all the tasks for a fraction of the weight, size and power requirements.

The spinout's enabling technologies are building upon Andrei's doctoral thesis, 'Cold atoms in your pocket', which focussed on the construction of these vacuum chambers, the study of the eutectic bond and the manufacturing of integrated electric feedthroughs, together with the development of new cold atom trap geometries.

"The emerging generation of quantum devices will revolutionise countless industries, including computing, civil engineering, telecoms, oil and gas, and semiconductors," Andrei says. "Aquark technologies is positioned at the heart of this step change, as we can achieve for quantum technology what miniaturising transistors did for semiconductors and so power the continued growth of this emerging industry.

"We will turn these incredible but complex devices into simple to use, plug-and-play systems, starting by establishing ourselves as market leaders in the miniaturisation of vacuum technology, atom sources and electronics."

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Published: 8 November 2019
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The dependence of the energy on the angle for polarised light reflected from birefringent optical cavity. Image credit: Mateusz Kral.

An international research collaboration including physicists from the University of Southampton has created a tunable thin optical cavity filled with liquid crystals and used it to emulate the physics of more complex relativistic interactions in solid state systems.

Researchers found that when the two-dimensional system was modified by an external voltage, photons behaved like massive particles endowed with a magnetic moment, called 'spin', under the influence of an artificial magnetic field.

The collaboration, which includes Physics and Astronomy's Professor Pavlos Lagoudakis, published their findings today in Science Science, the journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

The discovery of new phenomena involving the trapping of light in optically anisotropic cavities may enable the implementation of new optoelectronic devices that allow for propagation and manipulation of information in topologically protected states. The research area's prospect of creating a unique quantum state of matter - the Bose Einstein condensate - could also be used to perform calculations and simulations that are too difficult for modern computers.

Dr Jacek Szczytko, of the University of Warsaw, said: "We are hugely encouraged by the rapid progress we achieved in engineering tunable liquid crystal optical cavities and the rich physics we uncovered recently. Continuing our collaboration with Southampton, we are now working on integration of emitters within our devices to obtain Bose Einstein condensates (BEC) of polaritons opening new applications in quantum information processing and neuromorphic computation."

The international research combined scientists and students from the University of Warsaw, the University of Southampton, the Polish Military University of Technology, the Institute of Physics of the Polish Academy of Sciences and the Skolkovo Institute of Technology in Moscow.

Professor Pavlos Lagoudakis, of Physics and Astronomy at Southampton and Director of Hybrid Photonics at Skoltech, said: "Photons in a cavity behave as particles that experience polarisation mode splittings as effective magnetic fields, that in turn produce relativistic effects known as spin-orbit interactions. The physics of liquid crystal microcavities is extremely rich and offer a platform for emulation of more complex physical systems, a route that we actively pursue now in collaboration with IBM and our colleagues in Warsaw."

The project was funded by the Polish National Science Center, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, and the Ministry of National Defense, with Southampton's involvement supported by Professor Lagoudakis' £5m Hybrid Polaritonics programme grant from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.

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c.haws@soton.ac.uk

 

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Postgraduate researcher

Cori Haws is a postgraduate researcher as part of the Solid-State Quantum Optics group. 

He received an MPhys in Physics with Photonics at the University of Southampton in 2019.

His ongoing doctoral research is focused on the development of hybrid nanophotonic structures for the control and enhancement of single-photon emission by solid-state emitters.

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H.Ulbricht@soton.ac.uk

 

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Hendrik is Deputy Head of School for Research and Enterprise at the School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton until July 2022, and until August 2020 Head of the Quantum, Light & Matter (QLM) research devision at the same department.

Hendrik is Professor of Physics. He obtained his undergraduate degree in physics (Dipl.-Phys.) from the Technical University at Berlin (Germany) and the Albert Einstein Institute (Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics, Golm) in 2000 with a theoretical work on Black Hole Thermodynamics. He graduated with a PhD (Dr. rer. nat.) from the Free University of Berlin and the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society (Germany) in 2003 with a work on experimental surface science in the group of Nobel Laureate Gerhard Ertl (NP in Chemistry 2007). After a postdoc position at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, US on a Max Kade fellowship and as senior postdoc and Assistant Professor at the University of Vienna (Austria), he joined the Department of Physics & Astronomy in 2008 as a Reader and was promoted a personal chair in 2014. He leads the Quantum Nanophysics and Matterwave Interferometry research group. Ulbricht is the proud holder of the certification of apprenticeship as a bricklayer. 

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Hendrik's main research interests concern experimental tests of fundamental theories of Nature by table-top experiments but also in space. Some tests are concerned with the large mass limit of the quantum superposition principle, which forms the basis of quantum mechanics. Other experiments are concerned with testing the interplay between quantum mechanics and gravitation in the low energy limit.

The Ulbricht group performs quantum experimental research on the preparation and analysis of massive systems in non-classical states by various techniques. They pioneer so-called levitated opto- and magneto-mechanics experiments, where light and magnetic fields are used to both trap and control nano- and micro-particles in vacuum. Please see the Ulbricht group webpages for more details.

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mfk@soton.ac.uk

 

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Malgosia graduated from the University of Poznan in Poland and then received DPhil from the University of Oxford, researching four-wave mixing processes in gaseous media. She was a research fellow at the Department of Engineering Sciences at the University of Oxford, Optoelectronics Research Centre at Southampton and the Department of Physics at the University of Exeter. In 2010 she was appointed to a personal chair at the University of Southampton. Her research on nonlinear materials and photorefractive crystals was recognised by the awards of a Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin fellowship, followed by an EPSRC Advanced Fellowship. In 2020, Malgosia was nominated to became an SPIE Fellow.

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Malgosia is a group leader of Soft Photonics Systems group, pursuing research on soft matter for photovoltaics, life sciences and new generation of optical instruments.  

Her recent and current research interests include:

  • photovoltaic optical modulators
  • optical analyser for characterisation of soft matter,
  • liquid crystalline biofilms
  • soft matter colloids

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Coordinator and programme lead:

MPhys with Industrial Placements (PHYS6027)

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MSc Photonics Lab Skills module (OPTO6023)

Practical Photonics (PHYS2009)

Demonstator in the second year lab, Physics from Evidence PHYS2022,

Supervisor of MPhys projects (PHYS6006).

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dcsmith@soton.ac.uk

 MA, DPhil

Undergraduate Admissions Tutor, Postgraduate Admissions Tutor for Quantum, Light and Matter Group

Prof. Smith did his undergraduate degree in Natural Sciences at the University of Cambridge and a DPhil in Physics at Oxford on the "Ultrafast Dynamics of a Semiconductor, GaSb, and a High Temperature Superconductor, YBa2Cu3O7-d". He has held an EPSRC Advanced Fellowship (Early Career) and led a flagship EPSRC Basic Technology grant. He is now part an EPSRC programme grant (ADEPT) which is exploiting electrodeposition to deposit infrared detectors, phase change memory and thermoelectric devices.

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Prof. Smith uses advanced optical spectroscopic methods, particularly resonance Raman spectroscopy and ultrafast spectroscopy techniques, to study a range of nanomaterials. Currently he is studying 3 atom thick monolayers and heterostructures consisting of two monolayers of transition metal dichalcogenides. Resonance Raman spectroscopy allows him to probe optically dark, large wavevector excitons in these structures using double resonance processes. In addition the ability to associated particularly vibration frequencies with partricular materials allows him to probe the hybridisation of exciton and trions, both intralyer and interlayer, in heterostructures. In addition to the transition metal dichalcogenides he is studing extreme nanowires, 1-3 atoms in diameter, which can be formed inside the inner cavity of single walled carbon nanotubes.

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Prof. Smith is one of two admissions tutors for Physics and Astronomy. He is currently the course coordinator for Intro to Nano a second year course which is the students first opportunity to explore the fascinating effects which occur when the dimensions of objects are reduced to 2-2000 atoms.

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