Crystalline supermirrors for trace gas detection in environmental science and medicine

In an international cooperation with partners from industry and research, physicists from the University of Vienna, together with Thorlabs, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and the University of Kansas, have now succeeded for the first time in demonstrating high-performance laser mirrors in the sensing-relevant mid-infrared wavelength range that absorb less than ten out of a million photons. Manufactured in a new process based on crystalline materials, these low-loss mi...