Grant: Discovery Grants Program - Individual

Glass waveguide photonics. The proposed research program deals with fundamental studies that will lead to the development of new laser light sources and optical sensor devices. We use intense ultraviolet laser light to modify the properties of glasses and hence to fabricate structures into optical fibers and waveguides. These structures allow ordinary fibers and waveguides to become lasers or advanced optical processing devices. The main novelty that we are pursuing is the development of devices that are much smaller than currently available, and yet that will provide similar, and in some cases better performance. Furthermore, our approach to develop these novel devices is inherently low cost both in terms of starting materials (glasses) and of experimental apparatus. Much of the research is devoted towards finding the proper recipes to perform these irradiations and to choose or modify suitable glasses so that the fabricated structures are performing as required and that they are reliable for real life applications. We are also investigating various applications for our novel structures, mainly in biochemical sensing for environmental and health issues and in future high speed optical communications systems and networks.