Nanonics Imaging is proud to announce the top 3 winners of our 2015 image contest held to celebrate the launch of our new website. The winning entries are:

Metasurface Modes

by Sabine Dobmann of University of Erlangen-Nuremberg 

6um x 6um NSOM images collected with a MV 4000.  Optical modes supported by a metasurface designed for EOST (extraordinary suppressed transmission) are probed and mapped. Focused far-field light excites the metasurface grating with linear polarization either perpendicular (left) or parallel (right) to the array lines. Shown is the 3D overlay of the near-field intensity of the NSOM scan on the measured topography. The intensities for both polarization directions are normalized to their individual maximum. It is clearly show that for the resonant polarization (left) the electric field is localized on the metal ridges that act as antennas, while for the non-resonant polarization (right) the field is transmitted through the gaps of the grating. 

Ring on Fire 

by Meir Grajower, Hebrew University of Jerusalem

~26um x 26um Scanning thermal microscopy images collected with a MV 4000.  As miniaturization of hotonic devices continues to drive down their dimensions and increase the data rates, heating and heat removal in these devices pose significant limitation sto furhter improvement and development.  Here,  a temperature rise is measured in a photonic device known as a silicon micro ring resonator (MRR) with scanning thermal microscopy.

Particle in a Maze

by Omree Kapon of Bar-Ilan University

5um x 5um AFM image collected with a MV 2000.  Sometimes your experiment doesn't always go as planned.  While fabricating a grating consisting of lines, the photoresist concentration was too high and the resulting structure was fabricated instead.  The particle in the corner of "maze" is a form of contamination.