Spherical whispering‐gallery‐mode microresonators

Abstract

International audienceWhispering-gallery modes (WGM) on a spherical surface were first described by Lord Rayleigh at the beginning of the last century, but only after the invention of laser did they start to have some scientific relevance and only during the last two decades there has been a substantial move towards real devices and practical applications. WGM resonators have peculiar properties, the most notable being the potential of having an ultrahigh quality factor Q, which makes them very appealing both as laser cavities and as extremely sensitive sensors. Among the different types of WGM resonators, the microspherical ones represent a very important category, due to their simplicity, easy fabrication, and very high quality. In this review we provide a description of their fundamental properties and we summarize recent works on their application as filters, sensors and lasers

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“…For more information, we refer the readers to several reviews (Chiasera et al, 2010;He et al, 2013;Ilchenko and Matsko, 2006;Righini et al, 2011;Xiao et al, 2010).…”

Integrated polymer micro-ring resonators for optical sensing applications

“…1,2 Among the existing biological and chemical sensors, micro-resonators (MRs) have been demonstrated to be extremely sensitive and offer the advantage of significantly minimizing the device size, which greatly reduces the amount of molecules to be detected. 3,4 MRs based on integrated optical waveguides possess promising performances, particularly thanks to their integration capability with electronic devices as well as photonic devices, and to their easy fabrication with mature semiconductor processing technologies. [5][6][7] Moreover, these sensors allow label-free detection, compatibility with micro-fluidic handling and capability of providing high specificity using surface chemical modifications.…”

Observation of thermal feedback on the optical coupling noise of a microsphere attached to a low-spring-constant cantilever

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