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Category: holograms

Optoelectronics research could bring holograms to your smartphone and closer to everyday use

New research from the University of St Andrews paves the way for holographic technology, with the potential to transform smart devices, communication, gaming and entertainment.

In a study published in Light: Science & Applications, researchers from the School of Physics and Astronomy created a new optoelectronic device from the combined use of holographic metasurfaces (HMs) and (OLEDs).

Until now, holograms have been created using lasers. However, researchers have found that using OLEDs and HMs gives a simpler and more compact approach that is potentially cheaper and easier to apply, overcoming the main barriers to hologram technology being used more widely.

Tiny hologram inside a fiber lets scientists control light with incredible precision

Researchers in Germany have unveiled the Metafiber, a breakthrough device that allows ultra-precise, rapid, and compact control of light focus directly within an optical fiber. Unlike traditional systems that rely on bulky moving parts, the Metafiber uses a tiny 3D nanoprinted hologram on a dual-core fiber to steer light by adjusting power between its cores. This enables seamless, continuous focus shifts over microns with excellent beam quality.

Ultrathin metasurface enables high-efficiency vectorial holography

Holography—the science of recording and reconstructing light fields—has long been central to imaging, data storage, and encryption. Traditional holographic systems, however, rely on bulky optical setups and interference experiments, making them impractical for compact or integrated devices. Computational methods such as the Gerchberg–Saxton (GS) algorithm have simplified hologram design by eliminating the need for physical interference patterns, but these approaches typically produce scalar holograms with uniform polarization, limiting the amount of information that can be encoded.

New Technique Uses Focused Sound Waves and Holograms to Control Brain Circuits

NEW YORK, Aug. 5, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — A new study provides the first visual evidence showing that brain circuits in living animals can be activated by ultrasound waves projected into specific patterns (holograms).

Led by scientists at NYU Langone Health and at the University of Zurich and ETH Zurich in Switzerland, the study describes a system that combines sources of ultrasound waves and a fiber scope connected to a camera to visualize in study mice brain targets that are directly activated by the sound. This lays the groundwork, the study authors say, for a new way to treat neurological diseases and mental health disorders from outside of the body.

Already, there are applications approved by the Food and Drug Administration and designed to reduce tremor symptoms seen in Parkinson’s disease, using intense sound waves to kill brain cells called neurons within neural pathways linked to tremors. Rather than kill neurons, the lower-intensity ultrasound waves used in the current work can temporarily activate them, the researchers say. The resulting effects can be widespread as neurons relay messages to other neurons within their circuits and between interconnected neuronal circuits.

New 3D headset uses holograms and AI to create lifelike mixed reality visuals

Using 3D holograms polished by artificial intelligence, researchers introduce a lean, eyeglass-like 3D headset that they say is a significant step toward passing the “Visual Turing Test.”

“In the future, most virtual reality displays will be holographic,” said Gordon Wetzstein, a professor of electrical engineering at Stanford University, holding his lab’s latest project: a virtual reality display that is not much larger than a pair of regular eyeglasses. “Holography offers capabilities that we can’t get with any other type of display in a package that is much smaller than anything on the market today.”

Holography is a Nobel Prize-winning 3D display technique that uses both the reflecting from an object, as with a traditional photograph, and the phase of the light (the way the waves synchronize), to produce a hologram, a highly realistic three-dimensional image of the original object.

“It Sounds Impossible, but They Did It”: Students Use Quantum Entanglement to Power 3D Holograms, Stun Global Tech Community

IN A NUTSHELL 🚀 Brown University students developed a novel imaging technique using quantum entanglement to capture 3D images. 🔬 The method employs infrared light for illumination and visible light for imaging, enhancing depth resolution without costly infrared cameras. 🧪 The team solved the issue of phase wrapping by using two sets of entangled photons.

“Quantum Laws Just Got Twisted”: U.S. Engineers Use Entangled Light to Project Mind-Bending 3D Holograms in Real Time

IN A NUTSHELL 🔬 Brown University engineers utilize quantum entanglement to enhance 3D holographic imaging without traditional infrared cameras. 💡 The new technique, Quantum Multi-Wavelength Holography, overcomes phase wrapping challenges to deliver high-fidelity images. 🔍 By pairing infrared and visible light photons, the method captures both intensity and phase, offering unprecedented depth resolution. 🌟 Funded

“It Sounds Impossible, but They Did It”: Students Develop New Tech to Power 3D Holograms Using Quantum Entanglement

A novel microscopic imaging technique, developed by Brown University engineers to capture 3D images using quantum entanglement, may finally solve the problem of phase wrapping.

Undergraduate students Moe (Yameng) Zhang and Wenyu Liu presented their work at the recent Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics. They worked on an independent project under the supervision of senior research associate Petr Moroshkin and Professor Jimmy Xu.

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