Ultra-Thin Light Detector Sees Below the Surface

A newly developed, ultra-thin light detector may lead to a whole other generation of technology that can see below the surface of bodies, walls, and other objects.

Based off of the properties of graphene, researchers from the University of Maryland created a prototype that can see an extraordinarily broad band of wavelength, including those that are notoriously difficult to detect like terahertz waves.

A detector like this "could find applications in emerging terahertz fields such as mobile communications, medical imaging, chemical sensing, night vision and security," lead author Xinghan Cai said in a statement.

There are few technologies in existence that can detect terahertz waves, which are invisible to the naked eye, and those that can need to be kept extremely cold, -452 degrees Fahrenheit (-269 Celsius), in order to maintain their sensitivity.

The new light detector circumvents this problem by using graphene, a two-dimensional form of carbon that is only one atom thick.