Li Yinmei

Improvement of Transverse Trapping Efficiency of Optical Tweezers

Transverse trapping efficiency of optical tweezers is important in many force measurement applications. For improving the transverse trapping efficiency, we propose a simple scheme in which the Gaussian beam does not fully cover the aperture of the objective. Both experiment and theoretical simulation qualitatively demonstrate the scheme. It is expected that the results will be useful for the design of optical tweezers.

Observing Nanometre Scale Particles with Light Scattering for Manipulation Using Optical Tweezers

Nanometre-scale particles can be manipulated using optical tweezers, but cannot be directly observed. We present a simple method that nanoparticles can be directly observed using optical tweezers combined with dark field microscopy. A laser beam perpendicular to a tightly focused laser beam for trap illuminates specimen and does not enter objective, nanoparticles in focal plane all can be directly observed in dark field because of light scattering. It is implemented that the polystyrene beads of diameter 100nm can be directly observed and trapped.

Systematical study of the trapping forces of optical tweezers formed by different types of optical ring beams

The technique of optical tweezers has been improved a lot since its invention, which extends the application fields of optical tweezers. Besides the conventionally used Gaussian beams, different types of ring beams have also been used to form optical tweezers for different purposes. The two typical kinds of ring beams used in optical tweezers are the hollow Gaussian beam and Laguerre?Gaussian (LG) beam. Both theoretical computation and experiments have shown that the axial trapping force is improved for the ring beams compared with the Gaussian beam and hence the trapping stability is improved, although the transverse trapping forces of ring beams are smaller than that of Gaussian beam. However, no systematic study on the trapping forces of ring beam has ever been discussed. In this article, we will investigate the axial and transverse trapping forces of different types of ring beams with different parameters systematically, by numerical computation in which the ray optics model is adopted. The spherical aberration caused by the refractive index mismatch between oil and water is also considered in the article. The trapping forces for different objectives that obey the sine condition and tangent condition are also compared with each other. The result of systematical calculation will be useful for the applications of optical tweezers formed by different types of ring beams.

Stability of Novel Time-Sharing Dual Optical Tweezers Using a Rotating Tilt Glass Plate

A novel realization of time-sharing optical tweezers (TSOT) is demonstrated using a tilt glass plate. Objects are trapped in the time-sharing dual traps; each of them acts like a single beam gradient trap with an effective stiffness. The effective stiffness of TSOT is experimentally measured through analysis of dynamical images. In comparison, it is numerically calculated by adopting the Monte Carlo technique. Both simulation and experimental results agree well with each other and show a good linear relationship between the effective stiffness and trap switching frequency in the range from 5 Hz to 70 Hz.

In situ calibrating optical tweezers with sinusoidal-wave drag force method*

We introduce a corrected sinusoidal-wave drag force method (SDFM) into optical tweezers to calibrate the trapping stiffness of the optical trap and conversion factor (CF) of photodetectors. First, the theoretical analysis and experimental result demonstrate that the correction of SDFM is necessary, especially the error of no correction is up to 11.25% for a bead of 5 μm in diameter. Second, the simulation results demonstrate that the SDFM has a better performance in the calibration of optical tweezers than the triangular-wave drag force method (TDFM) and power spectrum density method (PSDM) at the same signal-to-noise ratio or trapping stiffness. Third, in experiments, the experimental standard deviations of calibration of trapping stiffness and CF with the SDFM are about less than 50% of TDFM and PSDM especially at low laser power. Finally, the experiments of stretching DNA verify that the in situ calibration with the SDFM improves the measurement stability and accuracy.

Manipulation of Nanoparticles Using Dark-Field-Illumination Optical Tweezers with Compensating Spherical Aberration

Based on our previous investigation of optical tweezers with dark field illumination [Chin. Phys. Lett. 25(2008)329], nanoparticles at large trap depth are better viewed in wide field and real time for a long time, but with poor forces. Here we present the mismatched tube length to compensate for spherical aberration of an oil-immersion objective in a glass-water interface in an optical tweezers system for manipulating nanoparticles. In this way, the critical power of stable trapping particles is measured at different trap depths. It is found that trap depth is enlarged for trapping nanoparticles and trapping forces are enhanced at large trap depth. According to the measurement, 70-nm particles are manipulated in three dimensions and observed clearly at large appropriate depth. This will expand applications of optical tweezers in a nanometre-scale colloidal system.