• Guided mode meta-optics: Metasurface-dressed nanophotonic waveguides for arbitrary designer mode couplers and on-chip OAM emitters with configurable topological charge

    分类: 光学 >> 量子光学 提交时间: 2023-02-19

    摘要: Metasurfaces have achieved fruitful results in tailoring complexing light fields in free space. However, a systematic investigation on applying the concept of meta-optics to completely control waveguide modes is still elusive. Here we present a comprehensive catalog capable of selectively and exclusively excite almost arbitrary high-order waveguide modes of interest, leveraging silicon metasurface-patterned silicon nitride waveguides. By simultaneously engineering the phase-matched gradient of the metasurface and the vectorial spatial modal overlap between the nanoantenna near-field and target waveguide mode for excitation, either single or multiple high-order modes are successfully launched with high purity reaching 98% and broad bandwidth. Moreover, on-chip twisted light generators are also theoretically demonstrated with configurable OAM topological charge \ell from -3 to +2, serving as a comprehensive framework for metasurface-enabled guided mode optics and motivating further applications such as versatile integrated couplers, demultiplexers, and mode-division multiplexing-based communication systems.

  • A juvenile skull of the longirostrine choristodere (Diapsida:Choristodera), Mengshanosaurus minimus gen. et sp. nov.,with comments on neochoristodere ontogeny

    分类: 生物学 >> 动物学 提交时间: 2021-06-21 合作期刊: 《古脊椎动物学报》

    摘要: Choristoderes were an important clade of semi-aquatic predators that occupied Laurasian freshwater ecosystems from the Middle Jurassic to the Miocene. During the Early Cretaceous, the neochoristodere lineage evolved large size and long snouts, converging on the body plan of modern crocodilians. Here, we describe a new longirostrine choristodere, Mengshanosaurus minimus gen. et sp. nov. from the Lower Cretaceous Mengyin Formation of Shandong Province, China. The holotype is the smallest reported neochoristodere individual, with a skull length of only 35 mm. The poorly ossified braincase, along with retention of a fontanel at the frontal-parietal suture, indicates this individual was a juvenile. Phylogenetic analyses recovered Mengshanosaurus as a neochoristodere, a placement supported by the presence of a single narial opening, fusion of the nasals, and expansion of the temporal fenestrae. In the Neochoristodera, Mengshanosaurus is sister to a clade consisting of Ikechosaurus, Tchoiria, Simoedosaurus, and Champsosaurus. It differs from other neochoristoderes in having the lacrimal foramen between the prefrontal and lacrimal, in addition to having large vomerine teeth (exceeding one-third the width of corresponding maxillary teeth). The closely arranged marginal teeth and large vomerine teeth suggest juvenile choristoderes may have fed on invertebrates and insects, similar to juveniles of modern crocodilians. However, the observation that very young neochoristoderes had similar skull proportions and marginal tooth shapes to adults, along with features suggesting a more fully aquatic ecology, suggest that neochoristoderes exhibited less pronounced ontogenetic niche shifts than modern crocodilians.