Interesting Stuff in Photonics

• Left-Handed Materials?
• Negative dielectric constant?

        (O. V. Dolgov et al., "On an admissible sign of the static dielectric function of matter," Rev. Mod. Phys., 53, 1, p.81, (1981))

• Photonic Crystals 
  (MIT Prof. Joannopoulos' Research Group)
  (UCLA Prof. Yablonovich's Research Group)
  
• Slowing the light down!
  (Zero Group Velocity of Light Pulse)
  
• Faster than Light?  Is Einstein wrong?
  Superluminal Flow of Light
  
• In the discussion of dispersion relation for slab waveguide (ch. 7) and quantum wells (ch. 9), we said that the bound states must exist in these one-dimensional problem.  In general, the criterion for the existence of those bound states solutions is derived in the following paper: Criterion for existence of a bound state in one dimension, by K. R. Brownstein, in American Journal of Physics, 68, p.160.
  
  For two-dimensional problems (e.g. quantum wires or rectangular waveguides), bound states always exist as in the one-dimensional case.  For three-dimensional problems, however, the result is NOT the same.  The potential well has to be sufficiently deep to support any bound state solution (you can try to solve the Schroedinger equation for a three-dimensional spherically symmetric square well potential and you'll find that a bound state doesn't necessarily have to exist.)