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There often appears unwanted elasto-optical birefringence in optical devices such as electro-optical, magneto-optical modulators and sensors when they are manufactured and used. This kind of elasto-optical birefringence causes unwanted effect for optical device and needs to be removed. Based on the method of index ellipsoid analysis, we theoretically analyze elasto-optical effects in various point groups of optical crystals and glasses, and accordingly propose some methods to eliminate unwanted elasto-optical birefringences in optical crystals and glasses. Main conclusions show that for orthorhombic biaxial crystal and the light wave propagating along any one crystalline axis of the crystal, if there is no shearing stress and the two external normal stresses applied to the other two crystalline axes can keep a constant ratio related to crystal parameters including refractive index and photoelastic constants, then unwanted elasto-optical birefringence can be eliminated from relevant optical devices, typical crystals include potassium titanium oxide phosphate (KTiOPO4, KTP) crystal and rubidium titanium oxide phosphate (RbTiOPO4, RTP) crystal, which are usually used as electrooptic Q-switchers in laser systems. For all the uniaxial crystyals such as potassium dihydron phosphate (KH2PO4, KDP), beta-barium borate ( -BaB2O4, BBO) and lithiun niobate (LiNbO3, LN) crystals, cubic crystals of 43 m, 432, m3 m point groups such as bismuth germanate (Bi4Ge3O12, BGO) crystal, and optical glasses, if the two normal stresses applied to the x1- and x2- crystalline axes of the crystal are equal to each other and there is no shearing stress, or there exists only one normal stress applied to the x3- crystalline axis of the crystal, then for the light wave propagating along the x3- crystalline axis, unwanted elasto-optical birefringence in relevant optical devices can also be eliminated. The above-proposed method to remove unwanted elasto-optical birefringence is benificial to design, manufacture, and usage of related optical devices.

Layered transition metal dichalcogenides (LTMDs) have renewed interest as electronic materials, but the poor conductivities hinder their further development. Chemical doping can often significantly modify atomic structures and electronic functionalities of a wide range of materials and thus acts as one of the most effective ways to precisely tune material properties for technological application. Here, the geometries and band structures as well as the densities of states of pure NbSe2 and Ti-doped NbSe2 nanostructure are studied by employing the ab-initio plane-wave ultra-soft pseudo potential technique based on the density functional theory. We optimize the ground state of NbSe2 in the layered structure by using the generalized gradient approximation for the exchange-correlation potential. The computational structural parameters are in good agreement with experimental values within 2.5%. To investigate the stability of the doped system with changing the concentration of Ti atoms, 2×2×1 2H-NbSe2 supercells are taken into consideration. Meanwhile, we consider a total of three possible Ti-doping models: substitution, intercalation, and embedded model, and investigate the energy band diagrams, state densities and densities of partial wave state diagram before and after the doping. The results show that the energy electron density of states reaches a higher peak, and the band structure near Fermi level (EF) is changed obviously, resulting in the variations of the band gap and EF position and then the increase of electronic conductivity after doping. In addition, our calculations also predict that the electron transport properties can be enhanced by doping Ti and it can be regarded as a useful way to tailor electronic states so as to improve electron transport properties of 2H-NbSe2. Such a remarkable modification of electronic structure of 2H-NbSe2 by chemical doping offers an additional way of modulating performances of LTMDs and developing new electrical contact composite materials.

Mutual compensation property between electrooptic and magnetooptic modulations in a crystal with electrooptic and magnetooptic effects and its application to magnetooptic sensor are investigated theoretically and experimentally. Under the condition of light intensity modulation, electrooptic and magnetooptic modulation effects can compensate for each other, so that the transmitted light intensity through the crystal can be kept at a certain fixed value. Based on this mutual compensation property, a novel optical current (or magnetic field) sensor is proposed and demonstrated experimentally by use of a single bismuth germanate (Bi4Ge3O12, BGO) crystal. The optical sensing unit is composed mainly of two polarizers and a block of BGO crystal with the shape of parallelogram. The BGO crystal itself can produce an optical phase bias of π/2, and it can be used as both a current sensing element and an electrooptic compensator. The change of magnetooptic rotation angle through the crystal can be compensated in real time by the change of electrooptic phase retardation caused by the applied voltage, thus the closed-loop optical measurement of current (or magnetic field) can be achieved. The 50 Hz ac current within 5 A is measured experimentally. The required compensating ac voltage is about 21.2 V/A in root-mean-square value. Experimental data show a good linear relationship between measured current and compensating voltage, and the nonlinear error is less than 1.7%.

In the applications of two external fields, such as stresses and electric fields, the optical modulation properties of some crystals are theoretically analyzed using the method of index ellipsoid. Simple mathematical formulas for the calculations of the field-induced principal refractive indexes of some crystals and corresponding azimuthal angles of their principal axes can be deduced from the equation of index ellipsoid if there exists only one nonzero cross term in the equation, e.g. x1x2. According to these simple formulas, we can find out some crystals exhibiting dual transverse electrooptic effect, e.g. crystals of the 6 symmetry point group. Under two simultaneously applied external stresses, elastooptic birefringence of a crystal is proportional to the difference between the two external stresses, and the orientations of their birefringent axes are unchanged. When a stress and an electric field are simultaneously and perpendicularly applied to some crystals such as cubic crystals of 43m point group, the field-induced birefringence of the crystal is proportional to the weighted geometric mean of the applied stress and electric field, and the orientations of their birefringent axes only depend on the ratio of the applied electric field and stress. The above electrooptic and elastooptic modulation properties are useful to the design of novel optical modulators and sensors.

By using the first-principles calculation based on density functional theory, we propose some approaches to improving the efficiency for the photocatalyst Ag2ZnSnS4 from a theoretical aspect. Comparing its band edge positions with those of other similar compounds, we find that Cu, Ge codoping can adjust both the band gaps and band edge positions of Ag2ZnSnS4 at the same time, which can optimize its band structure for water splitting. In addition, Ag2ZnSnS4 has a type-Ⅱ band offset with another photocatalyst CuGaSe2. Preparation of its homojunction can also improve their efficiencies of photocatalysis hydrolyzation.

The detailed expressions of orientation-related relative permeability in amorphous alloy ribbons and films with in-plane nearly transverse uniaxial anisotropy under applied driving ac current flowing through the ferromagnetic materials and dc external magnetic field are derived by simultaneously solving the Maxwell's equations and the Landau-Lifshitz equation of motion and establishing the magnetic domain structure model. The calculation formula of mean relative permeability averaging over 90°orientation angle and the magneto-impedance are obtained. The relation between permeability and the component of tensor susceptibility is deduced. The dependences of the real part and imaginary part of the relative permeability on frequency at several values of the applied external field are calculated, and the corresponding magnetic permeability spectra are plotted. The calculation formula of permeability which were inferred by Panina et al and Kraus can be unified by our theoretical result which is in good agreement with the experimental data under lower external magnetic field for both amorphous ribbons and films.