The Nanoscale Electro Optics lab aims to study the fundamentals of light-matter interactions at the nanoscale in order to develop the next generation of electro-optical devices. We are interested in a wide variety of applications such as: optical switches, biological and chemical detectors, ultrasmall lasers, frequency converters and solar cells.

Recent advances in nanotechnology grant us the opportunity to fabricate structures with features which are much smaller than optical wavelengths. As a consequence, the optical properties of these materials are no longer determined by nature, but by their building blocks and design concepts. This provides a powerful tool to control light better than ever. At the NEO Lab we are using this to explore the interaction of light and matter at the nanometer scale, in order to gain fundamental understanding of the underlying physical rules of the nano world and to develop new electro-optical devices.

• Nonlinear Metamaterials
  We create new nonlinear optical materials by fabricating metal-dielectric nano-complexes with small footprint and high nonlinear optical response.
  These nonlinear metamaterial allow nonlinear interactions such as second harmonic generation (frequency doubling), sum-frequency and difference frequency generation, THz generation and more.
  We investigate methods to control the nonlinear response by the design of the single nano-structure and the arrangement of the nonlinear elements which brings to collective effects.

• Active Plasmonic Nano Antennas
  We create nano antenna complexes with tunable and switchable characteristics by studying the response of nano-antennas to light and embeding nano antennas in active dielectric environment

• Excitonics
  We are studying the interactions between excitons and photons at nanostructured environment at the strong and weak coupling regimes and using it to find new ways to control light or to harness electromagnetic energy at the nano scale

Methods and Equipment

• Theory and simulations
  Each experiment is backed with a thorough theoretical investigation- from the fundamental equations to numerical simulations of the electro-magnetic fields, and their interaction with the nanostructure. We use commercial simulation software such as FDTD by Lumerical and finite-elements by COMSOL, as well as numerical simulation code which we write for our specific neesds.
• Fabrication
  The samples of the Nano-Electro-Optical structures that we investigate usually constructed of nanometric sized feature, which require electron beam lithography techniques to build and scanning electron microscopy to see. For such kind of sample fabrication and characterization, and more, we use the facilities of the Tel Aviv University Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology.
• Light sources and measurement devices
  In order to excite the optical structure and measure, our lab is equipped with the cutting edge technology of light sources and measurement devices. We use ultra-fast laser systems (Solstice ACE+TOPAS+NIRUVis by SpectraPhysics and Chameleon OPO-Vis by Coherent) to generate high power tunable pulses in the near IR and visible spectral range.  For detection and measurement we use a variety of spectrometers, single photon detectors, scientific cameras and more embedded with our optical setups. A near-field optical microscope allows us to measure the electro-magnetic interaction at the subwavelngth scale, and THz time domain spectroscopy (TDS) systems enable the invetsigation of the less familiar part of the electro-magnetic spectrum- The THz band.

For more information:
Email: tellenbogen@tauex.tau.ac.il
Phone: 03-6407372
Website:https://www.neolab.sites.tau.a…
Office: Computer and Software Engineering, 505