Posted on 04/25/2008 12:45:54 AM PDT by LibWhacker
A simple-to-make "superlens" can focus 10 times more sharply than a conventional lens. It could shrink the size of features on computer chips, or help power gadgets without wires.
No matter how powerful a conventional lens, it cannot focus light down to more than about half its wavelength, the "diffraction limit". This limits the amount of data that can be stored on a CD, and the size of features on computer chips.
Researchers have devised ways to beat the diffraction limit before, using bizarre "metamaterials" that are hard to make, and which are also the basis of prototype "invisibility cloaks".
But such complex mixes of material stuffed with tiny loops of metal and precisely-shaped holes are unlikely to become a mass-production technology.
(Excerpt) Read more at technology.newscientist.com ...
Very interesting. I wasn't aware of this method of focussing before reading the article. Given the above comment, though, I wonder what the spectral bandpass would be, say, for visible light.
The line: the new technology allows lens to focus their beams to a point equal to 1/20th of the wavelength of the frequency of the electromagnetic energy used in the beam. Conventional lens can only focus to 1/2 the wavelength
The catch: so far, it’s only been done on really, really, really, really big wavelengths.
The relevance: Laser beam are used for micro-technology, such as etching and reading pits in DVDs. Pit sizes can only be so small, so only so many can be etched into a given-sized disk, so disks have a limit to how much information they can hold. Making a smaller pit requires a shorter wavelength of light. That’s why many DVD manufacturers went from red-ray to blue-ray: they can store more information because the wavelengths of blue rays of light are smaller than red rays. Theoretically, we could have pits 1/10th the size without using higher-energy (shorter) wavelengths... which means 10 times more pits in each dimension. Or 100 times more on a flat surface. or 1000 times more on a holographic surface.
...1000 times more on a holographic surface, now we’re gettin’ somewhere, what’s the hold-up?
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