Egor V. Yakovlev

Non-Destructive Evaluation of Polymer Composite Materials at the Manufacturing Stage Using Terahertz Pulsed Spectroscopy

Nowadays, composite materials are widely used in building and construction industry, in motor-vehicles, spacecrafts and aircrafts, and in biomedical science due to the ability of combining various consistent components for manufacturing composite materials with physical and chemical properties significantly different from the properties of each component. Polymer composite materials (PCMs) appear to be the most common type of composites. PCMs consist mainly of polymer binder reinforced with the glass-fiber-fabric. Although PCMs are widely applied, PCM manufacturing technology lacks the methods of non- destructive testing. In this paper we demonstrate that terahertz (THz) pulsed spectroscopy (TPS) appears to be a unique instrument for solving important problems of PCM manufacturing control. We experimentally demonstrate the efficiency of TPS for non-destructive control of PCM binder polymerization, since THz radiation is sensitive to changes of picosecond dynamics in media. Furthermore, we show the ability to detect the internal non-impregnated voids inside the PCM structure by means of THz time-of-flight tomography. These results highlight the potentials of TPS applications for non-destructive control of PCM manufacturing process.

Band-gap nonlinear optical generation: The structure of internal optical field and the structural light focusing

A novel approach for the enhancement of nonlinear optical effects inside globular photonic crystals (PCs) is proposed and systematically studied via numerical simulations. The enhanced optical harmonic generation is associated with two- and three-dimensional PC pumping with the wavelength corresponding to different PC band-gaps. The interactions between light and the PC are numerically simulated using the finite-difference time-domain technique for solving the Maxwells equations. Both empty and infiltrated two-dimensional PC structures are considered. A significant enhancement of harmonic generation is predicted owing to the highly efficient PC pumping based on the structural light focusing effect inside the PC structure. It is shown that a highly efficient harmonic generation could be attained for both the empty and infiltrated two- and three-dimensional PCs. We are demonstrating the ability for two times enhancement of the parametric decay efficiency, one order enhancement of the second harmonic genera...

Nondestructive testing of polymer composite materials using THz radiation

This paper shows an ability to find internal defects in construction of polymer composite material using THz imaging. Using THz vision system resulted in an example of finding internal non-impregnated area in fiberglass.

BWO based THz imaging system

Terahertz (THz) imaging is a relatively new field of optical engineering and physics. Despite it has been already used in such directions as biomedical imaging, non-destructive evaluation of materials, and security detection of concealed objects, there are many problems in the development of them, connected with low efficiency of imaging sources and detectors. A new type of THz imaging system was implemented, based on backward wave oscillator THz source. Its efficiency of detecting concealed objects was shown.

Tunable two-dimensional assembly of colloidal particles in rotating electric fields

Tunable interparticle interactions in colloidal suspensions are of great interest because of their fundamental and practical significance. In this paper we present a new experimental setup for self-assembly of colloidal particles in two-dimensional systems, where the interactions are controlled by external rotating electric fields. The maximal magnitude of the field in a suspension is 25 V/mm, the field homogeneity is better than 1% over the horizontal distance of 250 μm, and the rotation frequency is in the range of 40 Hz to 30 kHz. Based on numerical electrostatic calculations for the developed setup with eight planar electrodes, we found optimal experimental conditions and performed demonstration experiments with a suspension of 2.12 μm silica particles in water. Thanks to its technological flexibility, the setup is well suited for particle-resolved studies of fundamental generic phenomena occurring in classical liquids and solids, and therefore it should be of interest for a broad community of soft matter, photonics, and material science.

Non-destructive testing of composite materials using terahertz time-domain spectroscopy

Development of novel methods for non-destructive evaluation of composite materials (CMs) at manufacturing and operational stages remains challenging problem of applied physics, optics and material science. In this paper, we have considered the ability to use the terahertz (THz) time-domain spectroscopy (TDS) for non-destructive evaluation of CMs. By combining the TDS technique with appropriate methods of solving the inverse ill-posed problems, we have shown that TDS could be applied for CM testing. At first, we have demonstrated that TDS could be used to control the polymerization process and, as a consequence, the CM binder curing. Secondary, we have shown the ability to detect the internal defects (non-impregnated voids) inside the CMs via the TDS-based THz time-of-flight tomography. Thereby, the results of our study allow highlighting the prospective of non-destructive evaluation of CMs using the TDS.

Colloidal suspensions in external rotating electric field: experimental studies and prospective applications in physics, material science, and biomedicine

Colloidal suspensions and tunable self-assembly of colloidal particles attract a great interest in recent years. In this paper, we propose a new setup and technology for studies of self-assembly of colloidal particles, interection of which between themselves is tuned by external rotating electric fields. We reveal wide prospectives of electric field employment for tunable self-assembly, from suspensions of inorganic particles to ensembles of biological cells. These results make enable particle-resolved studies of various collective phenomena and fundamental processes in many-particle systems in equilibrium state and far from it, while the dynamics can be resolved at the level of individual particles using video microscopy. For the first time, we demonstrate that, apart from ability to prepare photonic crystalline films of inorganic silica particles, the tunable self-assembly provides a novel technological way for manipulation with ensembles of biological cells by control of interactions between them.

Enhanced high-harmonic generation in photonics crystal: theoretical and experimental studies

The effect of strong localization of electromagnetic field in colloidal photonic crystals (PCs) is considered in present paper. It is shown theoretically that due to lateral modulation of dielectric permittivity of PC the sharp peaks of light’s intensity arise at the band-gap pumping, and light field decays parametrically with depth. The light itself localises at the near-surface volume of the PC and enhances nonlinear light conversion. Theoretical model to explain generic physical picture is presented for two-dimensional PC, and the analytical results are compared with numerical simulations by finite-difference time-domain method for solving the Maxwell’s equations. The fingerprints of enhanced high harmonic generation, which are observed in our experimental studies with globular quartz PCs, justify the main theoretical predictions.

Structural light focusing phenomenon and enhanced second harmonic generation in NaNO2-infiltrated opal photonic crystal

We report new experimental results on enhanced second harmonic generation using a structural light focusing phenomenon in photonic crystals (PCs). We use opal-based PC, infiltrated with NaNO2 and pumped with femtosecond laser pulses at various incidence angles, in order to examine the dependence of second harmonic generation efficiency on the pumping wavelength location toward the PC band-gap. We demonstrate one order enhancement of second harmonic generation in case of PC band-gap pumping in comparison to non-band- gap pumping. Second harmonic generation is performed in reflection mode with the maximum of generation in the direction of mirror reflection. We demonstrate that the spectrum of second harmonic does not narrow with the quasi-phase matching condition in case of band-gap generation, and second harmonic spectrum corresponding to non-band-gap generation undergoes 1.5 times narrowing due to the quasi-phase matching.