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A group of techniques known by the general name of single-molecule localization microscopy reaches a nanometer-scale spatial resolution of point light emitters, well below the diffraction limit of the traditional microscopy. The key feature of these techniques is blinking, alternation of bright and dark states, of each emitter so that no more than one emitter is bright within the width of the point-spread function of microscope during a time sufficient for its localization. We give a formulation of the optical part of these techniques in terms of quantum metrology, where the limit of precision is determined by the Fisher information on the emitters positions contained in the measurement data. We show that the advantage in resolution provided by making the emitters to blink is a consequence of the fundamental property of Fisher information, its convexity. In particular, we prove the weak matrix convexity and the trace convexity of the Fisher information matrix -- two fundamental results in the multiparameter estimation theory. We show also that the advantage in information is inherent to the quantum state of light itself before the measurement and is related to the convexity of the quantum Fisher information matrix., Comment: 16 pages, 6 figures

We propose a method of spatial resolution enhancement in metrology (thermometry, magnetometry, pH estimation and similar methods) with blinking fluorescent nanosensors by combining sensing with super-resolution optical fluctuation imaging (SOFI). To demonstrate efficiency of this approach, a model experiment with laser diodes modeling fluctuating nanoemitters and intentional blurring of the image is performed. The 2nd, 3rd, and 4th order cumulant images provide improvement of the contrast and enable successful reconstruction of smaller features of the modeled temperature (or any other physical parameter) distribution relatively to the intensity-based approach. We believe that blinking fluorescent sensing agents being complemented with the developed image analysis technique could be utilized routinely in the life science sector for recognizing the local changes in the spectral response of blinking fluorophores, e.g. delivered targetly to the wanted cell or even organelle. It is extremely useful for the local measurements of living cells' physical parameters changes due to applying any external "forces", including disease effect, aging, healing or response to the treatment.

It was demonstrated that optical modulation together with simultaneous terahertz (THz) imaging application enables an increase in contrast by an order of magnitude illustrating hence the technique as convenient contactless tool for characterization of graphene deposited on high-resistivity silicon substrates. It was shown that the single- and double-layer graphene can be discriminated and characterized via variation of THz image contrast using a discrete frequency in a continuous wave mode. Modulation depth of 45 % has been reached, the contrast variation from 0.16 up to 0.23 is exposed under laser illumination for the single and double layer graphene, respectively. The technique was applied in the development and investigation of graphene-based optical diffractive elements for THz imaging systems., Comment: 8 pages, 9 figures

We present the experimental and theoretical study of an ultrafast graphene based thin film absorption modulator for operation in the THz regime. The flat modulator is composed of a graphene sheet placed on a dielectric layer backed by a metallic back reflector. A near IR pulse induces the generation of hot carriers in the graphene sheet reducing effectively its conductivity. The system provides a platform with ultrafast modulation capability for flat optics and graphene based metasurfaces applications.

In recent years, there have been conflicting reports regarding the ultrafast photoconductive response of films of single walled carbon nanotubes (CNTs), which apparently exhibit photoconductivities that can differ even in sign. Here, we observe explicitly that the THz photoconductivity of CNT films is a highly variable quantity which correlates with the length of the CNTs, while the chirality distribution has little influence. Moreover, by comparing the photo-induced change in THz conductivity with heat-induced changes, we show that both occur primarily due to heat-generated modification of the Drude electron relaxation rate, resulting in a broadening of the plasmonic resonance present in finite-length metallic and doped semiconducting CNTs. This clarifies the nature of the photo-response of CNT films and demonstrates the need to carefully consider the geometry of the CNTs, specifically the length, when considering them for application in optoelectronic devices., Comment: Submitted to Physical Review Letters: Currently being reviewed by referees. Main manuscript: 5 pages, 3 figures. Supplementary data: 6 pages, 6 figures

We measure the conductivity spectra of thin films comprising bundled single-walled carbon nanotubes (CNTs) of different average lengths in the frequency range 0.3-1000 THz and temperature interval 10-530 K. The observed temperature-induced changes in the terahertz conductivity spectra are shown to depend strongly on the average CNT length, with a conductivity around 1 THz that increases/decreases as the temperature increases for short/long tubes. This behaviour originates from the temperature dependence of the electron scattering rate, which we obtain from Drude fits of the measured conductivity in the range 0.3-2 THz for 10 $\mu$m length CNTs. This increasing scattering rate with temperature results in a subsequent broadening of the observed THz conductivity peak at higher temperatures and a shift to lower frequencies for increasing CNT length. Finally, we show that the change in conductivity with temperature depends not only on tube length, but also varies with tube density. We record the effective conductivities of composite films comprising mixtures of WS$_2$ nanotubes and CNTs vs CNT density for frequencies in the range 0.3-1 THz, finding that the conductivity increases/decreases for low/high density films as the temperature increases. This effect arises due to the density dependence of the effective length of conducting pathways in the composite films, which again leads to a shift and temperature dependent broadening of the THz conductivity peak., Comment: Submitted to Journal of Physics D. Main manuscript: 9 pages, 8 figures. Supplementary material: 5 pages, 6 figures