By Sara Zaske, Stanford University February 27, 2026
Collected at: https://scitechdaily.com/tiny-new-optical-amplifier-boosts-light-by-100x/
A new Stanford-designed optical amplifier uses energy recycling in a resonator to deliver strong, low-noise amplification with far less power.
Light underpins much of today’s technology, from televisions and satellites to the fiber optic cables that transmit internet data across continents. A team of Stanford physicists has now developed a way to push light-based systems even further. Their fingertip-sized optical amplifier operates with very low-energy demands and maintains full bandwidth performance.
Like an audio amplifier that boosts sound, an optical amplifier increases the strength of a light signal. Many compact amplifiers currently available require substantial power to operate. The new device, described in the journal Nature, overcomes this limitation by reusing much of the energy that powers it, greatly improving efficiency.
“We’ve demonstrated, for the first time, a truly versatile, low-power optical amplifier, one that can operate across the optical spectrum and is efficient enough that it can be integrated on a chip,” said Amir Safavi-Naeini, the study’s senior author and associate professor of physics in Stanford’s School of Humanities and Sciences. “That means we can now build much more complex optical systems than were possible before.”
High Efficiency and Chip-Scale Integration
The amplifier developed at Stanford can increase a light signal’s intensity by roughly 100 times while drawing only a few hundred milliwatts of power, far less than comparable devices of similar size. Because it combines strong performance with compact dimensions, it could run on battery power and be incorporated into laptops or smartphones.
Boosting signals often introduces unwanted noise, which can interfere with data transmission. The researchers showed that their amplifier keeps added noise to a minimum. It also supports a wider bandwidth than existing compact amplifiers, allowing it to handle a broader range of light frequencies. Together, these features translate into higher data capacity with reduced interference.
This amplifier relies on energy stored in a light beam known as a “pump.” Its effectiveness depends on how intense that pump beam becomes.
Resonator Design and Energy Recycling
“By recycling the energy of the pump that powers this amplifier, we made it more efficient, and this doesn’t come at a cost to its other properties,” said Devin Dean, co-first author on the study and a doctoral student in Safavi-Naeini’s lab.
To achieve this, the team employed a resonant structure similar to designs used in lasers as an “energy recycling trick,” according to Dean. In such systems, light is reflected onto itself, increasing its strength in much the same way that light intensifies when it bounces between two mirrors.
In this amplifier, the pump light is created inside a resonator, where it circulates in a loop resembling a racetrack. As it travels around this path, its intensity builds, enabling it to amplify the target signal more effectively. By generating greater intensity from lower input power, the system achieves significantly improved efficiency.
Battery-Powered Devices and Future Applications
Thanks to its reduced power requirements and miniature scale, the amplifier could operate on battery power and fit into devices as small as smartphones.
“When you can do that, then the possibilities are really quite broad because they are so small that you can mass produce them and power them with batteries,” Dean said. “They could be used potentially for data communications, biosensing, making new light sources, or a host of different things.”
Reference: “Low-power integrated optical amplification through second-harmonic resonance” by Devin J. Dean, Taewon Park, Hubert S. Stokowski, Luke Qi, Sam Robison, Alexander Y. Hwang, Jason F. Herrmann, Martin M. Fejer and Amir H. Safavi-Naeini, 28 January 2026, Nature.
DOI: 10.1038/s41586-025-09959-z
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