(Press-News.org) Polaritons are formed by the strong coupling of light and matter. When they mix together, all the matter is excited simultaneously – referred to as delocalization. This delocalization has the unique ability to relay energy between matter that is otherwise not possible.
Disordered energy is ubiquitous in nature and the universe. Disordered energy is less organized and less available to do work, such as with heat dissipation. Even in plants, disorder can ruin effective energy transfer. In the context of polaritons, as disorder increases, it can negatively affect light-matter interactions, including polariton-enabled energy transfers. Overcoming this disorder is an important topic across many scientific fields.
In a new study, researchers from UC San Diego designed experiments to show how disordered energy can limit the energy transfer pathway, and further demonstrated a strategy to overcome this limitation.
This work establishes a new theoretical criteria beyond which polariton formation can retain its coherent delocalization – a feature that can influence the properties of matter to control chemical reactions, with potential applications in energy technology and photonic engineering.
END
Overcoming disordered energy in light-matter interactions
2025-08-21
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Zoo populations hold key to saving Pacific pocket mouse
2025-08-21
CONTACT:
San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance
Public Relations
619-685-3291
publicrelations@sdzwa.org
sdzwa.org
PHOTOS AND VIDEO: https://sandiegozoo.box.com/s/mu2h8bea811yx58oq11fs4q8l3binow8
SAN DIEGO (Aug. 21, 2025) – Endangered Pacific pocket mice, native to Southern California, were once thought to be extinct until a tiny remnant population was rediscovered in the mid-1990s. San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance established a conservation breeding and reintroduction program to save the species from extinction. Though there has been significant success with breeding and reintroduction, the species is ...
Astronomers detect the brightest fast radio burst of all time
2025-08-21
CAMBRIDGE, MA -- A fast radio burst is an immense flash of radio emission that lasts for just a few milliseconds, during which it can momentarily outshine every other radio source in its galaxy. These flares can be so bright that their light can be seen from halfway across the universe, several billion light years away.
The sources of these brief and dazzling signals are unknown. But scientists now have a chance to study a fast radio burst (FRB) in unprecedented detail. An international team of scientists including physicists at MIT have detected a near and ultrabright fast ...
OET inaugural cover | 30 years of nanoimprint lithography: Leading the new era of nanomanufacturing
2025-08-21
Professor L. Jay Guo’s group from the University of Michigan published a comprehensive review titled “30 years of nanoimprint: development, momentum and prospects” in the inaugural issue of Opto-Electronic Technology, systematically summarizing key developments and future trends in NIL, with a special focus on industry advancements in nano-Si device manufacturing and nanophotonics.
The review elaborates extensively on two main NIL methods: thermal NIL (T-NIL) and UV NIL (UV-NIL), examining ...
Metalens evolution: From individual devices to integrated arrays
2025-08-21
The research group of Prof. Din Ping Tsai from City University of Hong Kong was invited to publish a review article titled “Progress in Metalenses: From Single to Array” in the first issue of Opto-Electronic Technology in 2025. The article provides a structured overview of recent developments in metalenses, with a focus on the gradual transition from single-device optimization to system-level integration based on increasing structural complexity.
The article first reviews the long-standing challenges in metalens research, such as broadening the achromatic bandwidth and increasing the aperture size, and highlights representative studies and key breakthroughs in these areas. In ...
Advancing disaster response with the EBD dataset
2025-08-21
A new dataset, the Extensible Building Damage (EBD) dataset, offers significant improvements in disaster response mapping by combining satellite imagery and deep learning techniques. This dataset, covering 12 natural disasters, uses semi-supervised fine-tuning (SS-FT) to reduce the time and effort traditionally required for manual damage labeling, speeding up disaster recovery efforts globally.
Building damage assessments (BDA) are crucial for post-disaster recovery, as they help in identifying areas most in need of urgent assistance. However, current BDA methods suffer from slow dataset development, largely ...
Putting solar panels in space could aid Europe’s net-zero transition
2025-08-21
Space-based solar panels could enable solar power to be harvested continuously instead of only when sunlight reaches Earth, reducing Europe’s need for Earth-based wind and solar by 80%, finds a study publishing August 21 in the Cell Press journal Joule. Using energy models, researchers estimate that in 2050, space-based solar power could cut the total costs of Europe’s total grid system by 7%–15%. However, these numbers hinge upon the rapid development of two NASA-designed technologies in order to meet Europe’s goal to achieve net-zero by 2050.
“In space, you potentially have the ability to position solar panels to always face ...
Ambient documentation technologies reduce physician burnout and restore ‘joy’ in medicine
2025-08-21
A new study led by Mass General Brigham researchers reveals that ambient documentation technologies – generative artificial intelligence scribes that record patient visits and draft clinical notes for physician review before incorporating into electronic health records – led to significant reductions in physician burnout. The findings, published in JAMA Network Open, draw on surveys of more than 1,400 physicians and advanced practice providers at both Mass General Brigham based and Atlanta’s ...
Solar panels in space could cut Europe’s renewable energy needs by 80%
2025-08-21
Space-based solar power has the potential to reduce Europe’s need for land-based renewable energy by up to 80% - a potential game-changer for reaching net-zero by 2050.
For the first time, researchers from King’s College London have assessed the possible impact that generating solar energy in space could have for Europe. They found it could cut energy battery storage needs by more than two-thirds.
The study, published in Joule, analysed the potential of a design by NASA for solar generation, ...
Computational approach meets biology to connect neural progenitor cells with human disorders
2025-08-21
For much of the 20th century it was thought that the adult brain was incapable of regeneration. This view has since shifted dramatically and neurogenesis – the birth of new neurons – is now a widely accepted phenomenon in the adult brain, offering promising avenues for treating many neurological conditions. One of the main challenges in the field has been identifying neural stem and progenitor cells (NPCs) responsible for generating these new neurons. NPCs are rare, diverse and difficult to isolate from other brain cells due to overlapping molecular signatures. As a result, understanding their biology – and particularly their role in human brain disorders – ...
GLP-1 receptor agonists and cancer risk in adults with obesity
2025-08-21
About The Study: This retrospective cohort study found that taking glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists (GLP-1RAs) was associated with a reduced overall risk of cancer, including lower risks of endometrial, ovarian, and meningioma cancers, among patients with obesity or overweight. However, taking GLP-1RAs may be associated with an increased risk of kidney cancer, highlighting the need for longer-term follow-up to clarify the underlying mechanisms and clinical implications of these findings.
Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, ...