Physicists promise a copper revolution in nanophotonics

Researchers from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (MIPT) have for the first time experimentally demonstrated that copper nanophotonic components can operate successfully in photonic devices -- it was previously believed that only gold and silver components have the required properties for this. Copper components are not only just as good as components based on noble metals, but, unlike them, they can easily be implemented in integrated circuits using industry-standard fabrication processes. "This is a kind of revolution -- using copper will solve one of the main problems in nanophotonics," say the authors of the paper. The results have been published in the scientific journal Nano Letters.