Since their invention in 1986 by Arthur Ashkin and colleagues, optical tweezers have
become an essential tool in several fields of physics, spectroscopy, biology …

The phenomenon of light's momentum was first observed in the laboratory at the beginning
of the twentieth century, and its potential for manipulating microscopic particles was …

Diffraction is a cornerstone of optical physics and has implications for the design of all
optical systems. The paper discusses the so-called'non-diffracting'light field, commonly …

An optically trapped Brownian particle is a sensitive probe of molecular and nanoscopic
forces. An understanding of its motion, which is caused by the interplay of random and …

Nucleic acid hairpins provide a powerful model system for understanding macromolecular
folding, with free-energy landscapes that can be readily manipulated by changing the …

Understanding the thermally activated escape from a metastable state is at the heart of
important phenomena such as the folding dynamics of proteins,, the kinetics of chemical …

A one-dimensional optically coupled array of colloidal particles is created in a potential well
formed by two counterpropagating Gaussian light beams. This array has analogies to linear …

Light can influence the motion of particles, from the size of a single cell down to a single
atom. This has led to the field of optical micromanipulation, where one may guide, trap, and …

Rare transitions between long-lived metastable states underlie a great variety of physical,
chemical and biological processes. Our quantitative understanding of reactive mechanisms …