Covering the green gap

Client
NIST
Year
2024
Type
photomontage / explanatory diagram / animation
Field
nanophotonics / chip-scale lasers
Links
NIST story / paper
Description
Images for a NIST story about tiny chip-based lasers that fill the green gap in visible light.

Context

The story explained a chip-scale source of yellow and green laser light. These colors are difficult to produce with compact lasers, leaving a long-standing green gap between red and blue devices.

Approach

The paper figures were dense and technical. For the news story, I split the work into separate images showing the green-gap problem, how the microring converts infrared pump light into visible output, and how the undercut device design helped cover the full green-gap range.

Figures

Compact laser diodes cover red and blue wavelengths more readily than the yellow and green region.
A microring resonator converts infrared pump light into two output wavelengths: a visible signal and an infrared idler.
Changing the microring thickness and undercutting the support layer helped produce more wavelengths across the green gap.
Animation showing visible output colors generated as the infrared pump wavelength changes.