PHOTONICS LABORATORY

IN-CHARGE: PROF. R. VIJAYA

Brief information about Prof. Vijaya:

2011-ongoing: Professor (IIT Kanpur)

2009-2011: Visiting professor at IIT Kanpur (inter-IIT faculty exchange from IIT Bombay)

1997-2011: Faculty member (Assistant/Associate/Full Professor) at IIT Bombay

1993-1997: Lecturer at SSSIHL

1992-1993: CSIR Research Associate at IIT Madras
She completed Doctoral (1991) and Masters (1987) degrees from IIT Madras, and Bachelors degree from Meenakshi College, Madras.

She has a strong interest in all branches of Experimental Photonics and Electromagnetics.

In Photonics laboratory, research is carried out in topics such as photonic crystals, fiber lasers, waveguides, special-purpose optics, micro-strip patch antennas, nonlinear effects such as four wave mixing, plasmonics, and metasurfaces.

Teaching duties

RESEARCH TOPICS: FIBER OPTICS, PHOTONIC CRYSTALS, NONLINEAR OPTICS, RF, AND SPECIAL-PURPOSE OPTICS

(experimental work and simulation)

1997-ongoing

NONLINEAR OPTICS

Our work spans over topics such as Four wave mixing, stimulated Brillouin scattering, stimulated Raman scattering, slow light, saturable absorption and optical bistability in optical waveguides/fibers.
In waveguide geometry, these effects are possible without the requirement of high peak powers, and hence are possible with continuous wave laser sources.

1999-ongoing

FIBER OPTICS

The topics studied over the years have covered both fiber amplifiers and fiber lasers. A few of these topics are high-power fiber-optic amplifiers, fiber loop mirrors, erbium-doped fiber laser with continuous wave / tunable / mode-locked / multi-wavelength / broadband / periodic / chaotic output.
Our interest spans laser physics along with nonlinear optics and nonlinear dynamical effects in fibers.

2001-ongoing

NANOPHOTONICS (PHOTONIC CRYSTALS)

The theme of Photonic crystals is studied through a variety of experiments and simulations. In most of our work, photonic crystals are made by self-assembly. In some cases, they are made by electron beam lithography (EBL) and/or focused ion beam (FIB) milling. We study the processes of light guidance, stopband effects, fluorescence/emission and control of emission in photonic crystal cavities for lasing.

2016-ongoing

RF (ANTENNAS AND FSS)

We work on antennas and frequency-selective surfaces / metasurfaces with frequency response at selective frequencies. We design the antennas and metasurfaces, make them using the existing facilities, as well as characterize them. Our frequency range of interest is from a few GHz to hundreds of GHz. The antenna design is based on micro-strip patch. The metasurface design depends on the application.

2017-ongoing

SPECIAL-PURPOSE OPTICS

This is an effort to make high-reflection, anti-reflection, partial-reflection and special-purpose coatings for various applications. We use an RF sputtering system to coat oxide layers of precise thickness on various substrates.
Reflectance > 99% or < 1% have been obtained with these coatings. Wavelength range in visible and NIR is of our interest.

as much as possible....

OUTREACH WORK

Over the years, funding has been received for our Outreach efforts from SPIE (USA), IEEE Photonics Society (USA) and IIT Kanpur to conduct many events, prepare school- and college-level kits for education, to travel within India and abroad for delivering lectures, and to interact with students pursuing studies in STEM disciplines. Writing articles of general interest is also attempted.