Photonics and advanced materials are key enabling technologies for the 21st century. Photons, quanta of light, are the primary information carriers of our age, delivering video, internet and telephone calls through global information networks. Displays, laser surgery and manufacturing, metrology and many security applications all depend upon our ability to master light. And progress in improving the performance of all light-enabled devices depends entirely upon the functionality of available photonic materials.
Metamaterials offering “optical properties on-demand” are now changing the photonics technology paradigm: Media with properties prescribed by nanoscale design, which can be dynamically controlled at any point in space and/or moment in time, may be achieved using emerging paradigms of structurally reconfigurable, phase-change, and coherently-controlled metamaterials.
Our innovative and interdisciplinary programme aims, through better understanding the new physics of these advanced materials, to develop novel photonic metadevices and to explore their technological applications, particularly in telecommunications systems. It is led by the University of Southampton, involving the Optoelectronics Research Centre, the Department of Chemistry, and the Department of Physics & Astronomy, in conjunction with Heriot-Watt University's Institute of Photonics and Quantum Sciences.
The Programme is funded by the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council for six years (2015-2021; £5.6M) and is supported by international academic partners at Nanyang Technological University (Singapore) and the National Taiwan University, and by industrial partners Dstl, Oclaro Technology Ltd., BAE Systems plc and Ilika plc.
