키랄 메타표면이 데이터 인코딩을 혁신하는 방법

키랄리티란 무엇인가? 대칭 뒤의 과학 탐구

In nature, symmetry is a fundamental feature of many things, including the components of DNA and light itself. It is possible that two molecules almost identical to each other differ not in their composition or shape, but in their orientation, a concept called “chirality”.

키랄리티는 가장 간단히 말해 왼손과 오른손이 형태, 구조, 기능이 동일함에도 불구하고 서로 다른 이유를 설명합니다.

키랄리티는 생물학에서 근본적인 역할을 하며, 자연 선택은 오직 “우손형” DNA 분자, 당, 그리고 아미노산(단백질의 기본 구성 요소)만을 선택했습니다.

같은 현상이 빛에도 적용될 수 있는데, 빛은 왼쪽 또는 오른쪽으로 편광될 수 있어 전기장의 방향이 바뀝니다.

키랄 분자를 편광된 빛에 노출하면, 빛의 편광 방향에 따라 반응이 달라집니다.

이는 물리학에서 잘 알려진 현상이지만, 지금까지는 실용적인 응용에 사용하기엔 너무 약했습니다. 그러나 스위스 로잔 연방공과대학(EPFL), 호주 국립대학, 그리고 사우스오스트레일리아 대학교 연구진의 작업 덕분에 상황이 바뀌었을 가능성이 있습니다.

They published their results in Nature Communications¹, under the title “Chirality encoding in resonant metasurfaces governed by lattice symmetries”.

메타 원자가 조정 가능한 키랄 메타표면을 가능하게 하는 방법

Scientists have been developing new types of materials, called metamaterials, for a few decades. Metamaterials derive new properties not found in nature, not from their composition alone, but from how their internal structure is designed.

Meta-atoms are the blocks from which metamaterials are made.

The researchers have developed 2D lattices composed of tiny elements (the meta-atoms) that can easily tune their chiral properties.

출처: Nature

By varying the orientation of meta-atoms within a lattice, scientists can control the resulting metasurface’s interaction with polarized light.

출처: Nature

광 기반 데이터 인코딩을 위한 키랄 툴킷

Previous attempts to use chirality to control interaction with light had limited success. In large part, this was due to a too difficult approach, using very complex meta-atom geometries.

Instead, the Swiss and Australian researchers leveraged the interaction between the shape of the meta-atoms and the symmetry of the lattice. They used a metasurface made of germanium and calcium difluoride.

출처: Nature

As a result, they could produce a predictable chiral behavior, tunable by simple parameters, hence creating a universal toolkit for on-demand chiral design.

The inverted metasurface pattern was written using electron beam lithography.

이중 데이터 전송

As a proof-of-concept, the researchers created an image with 2 layers of data encoded by a metasurface, one with normal light and one with polarized light.

출처: Nature

The “transmission image” was encoded by the size of the meta atoms, and could be decoded using unpolarized light. The “chiral image” was encoded by the orientation of the meta atoms, revealed when exposed to circularly polarized light.

“This experiment showcased our technique’s ability to produce a dual layer ‘watermark’ invisible to the human eye, paving the way for advanced anticounterfeiting, camouflage and security applications,”

Ivan Sinev – Bionanophotonics Systems Lab researcher.

The light used was in the middle of the infrared range, making it relatively low-cost and easy to use.

키랄 인코딩 기술의 실제 적용 사례

The first field of application of this technology is for advanced encryption, tagging, and other anticounterfeiting measures.

Using this technique, a unique and secret level of encoding, only doable with this chiral toolkit on hand, could be used to certify the authenticity of bank notes, ID cards, payment systems, and other identification systems.

Another option could be to use this technique to create sensors sensitive to chiral structures. As most biological molecules are chiral, this could be used in distinguishing between left- and right-handed biomolecules.

출처: Nature

As the system can be tuned along a gradient, it could also allow for scalable sensing of chiral molecules.

“We can use chiral metastructures like ours to sense, for example, drug composition or purity from small-volume samples. It could make the difference between a medicine and a toxin,”

Felix Richter – Bionanophotonic Systems Lab researcher.

Polarized light is also very important in advanced computing systems emerging as a potential alternative to current silicon chips. This includes photonics and optical computing, as well as quantum computing and quantum photonics.

This sort of tunable chiral system could be used to make further progress in the control of polarized light, increasing the precision and reducing the cost of such tools for new types of advanced computing.

상장된 최고의 레이저 및 포토닉스 기업

Coherent (II-VI Marlow): 레이저 혁신을 선도하는 기업

As photonics and metamaterials become more important in many industries, the main tools for these techniques, lasers, are also seeing their market grow.

Coherent is a large industrial conglomerate with 26,000+ employees and a leader in laser technology. It resulted from the merger of advanced material II-VI (COHR ) Marlow with laser maker Coherent.

The company is an expert in advanced materials used in lasers, optics, and photonics, such as indium phosphide, epitaxial wafers, and gallium arsenide.

It grew largely thanks to multiple acquisitions over the last decade, from $600M in revenues in 2013 to $4.7B in 2024.

The company derives 29% of its revenues from lasers directly, with the rest linked to associated equipment like optical fiber and electronics. The instrumentation category mostly includes life sciences and medical applications.

출처: Coherent

The presence of the company in advanced materials like thermophotovoltaics (which we discussed in a previous article), silicon carbide, lasers, and electronics helps it benefit from structural trends like the growth of precision manufacturing, additive manufacturing (3D printing), electrification, and renewable energies.

The company has recently separated its silicon carbide business into a new entity, owned at 75% by Coherent, with the rest owned equally by its partners Mitsubishi Electric (bringing silicon carbide power IP) and Denso (bringing its activity as an automotive supplier on electrification and power semiconductors).

This is because silicon carbide is increasingly its own technology, separated from laser, mostly used in high-power applications like EVs, batteries, and renewable energy. (You can read more about silicon carbide in our dedicated investment report about this technology.)

Coherent’s lasers make it a leader in LIDAR and 3D-digital sensing, including for self-driving applications, biotech Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) Flow Cells, and lasers for semiconductor manufacturing. It expects its main markets to grow at 8-20%.

출처: Coherent

Other potential new applications of lasers, like direct energy weapons, photonic computing, nuclear fusion, and spacetech, could all equally help sustain the long-term growth of the company.

Overall, Coherent is as close as it can get to a “pure play” publicly traded laser company for investors interested in the sector, with strong vertical integration and 3,100+ patents protecting its innovations.

As photonics progresses, it will progressively increase the demand for ultra-fast, ultra-precise laser systems, as well as lasers used in optical telecommunications.

최신 Coherent (COHR) 주식 뉴스 및 개발

참조 연구

^{1. Sinev, I., Richter, F.U., Toftul, I. et al. Chirality encoding in resonant metasurfaces governed by lattice symmetries. Nature Communications 16, 6091 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-61221-2}