Super thin optical fibres and near lossless Wi-Fi, radio or mobile phone transmissions could be on the way, thanks to the work of a team of researchers in developing “echo-less” lights.
The research team from the Centre for Ultrahigh Bandwidth Devices for Optical systems (CUDOS), which included The University of Queensland’s Dr Joel Carpenter, was working on light states that allow light to travel through complex obstacles without scattering.
These light states were first proposed in 1948, but were never tested.
Obstacles usually scatter waves of light, sound or radio, resulting in loss of signal strength. But the technique from CUDOS allows the entire wave to arrive at its point of destination, echo- or scatter-free.
Dr Carpenter, who designed and performed the experiments, likened the waves of light to yelling a message to a friend at the end of a tunnel.
“Because of the way sound waves bounce off walls and other objects, the message your friend receives will be distorted by echoes and they might not be able to understand you,” Dr Carpenter said.
With this “non-echoing” light, it may be possible for the medical industry to develop miniscule endoscopes that can provide insights into the body without being too intrusive.
“We demonstrated this new phenomenon using light waves in optical fibres by precisely measuring the way light travels through the fibre in space and time,” Dr Carpenter explained.
“Then, we worked out what shape laser beams need to be in order to travel through without echoes, and generated beams of those shapes, put them into the fibre, before confirming that all the light arrived simultaneously at the other end.”
Although the researchers used light, the principle is also applicable to other waves like sound waves or waves in WiFi, radio or mobile phones transmission.