Optoelectronics, photonics and sensors

1Introduction to Optoelectronics: History and fundamentals

This chapter describes some important highlights in the history of optoelectronics and also includes a short list of some important applications related to this field of physics.

Optoelectronics is a part of photonics science related to the study and application of electronic devices that interact with light, systems where electrons and photons coexist. Optoelectronic devices operate as electrical-to-optical or optical-to-electrical transducers.

Some highlights in optoelectronics history are the following:

First observation of electroluminescence from SiC crystals was reported in the year 1907 by Captain Henry Joseph Round (England).
Some decades later, in 1927, Oleg Vladimirovich Losev (Imperial Russia) observed light emission from zinc oxide and silicon carbide crystal rectifier diodes used in radio receivers when a current was passed through them [1].
In 1961 Ali Javan (Bell Labs) invented the first gas or helium neon laser. One year later, Robert Hall invented the semiconductor injection laser.
Nick Holonyak (USA) invented the first practically useful visible LED (light emission diode) in 1962.
The first transmission trunk using glass fibres invented by Corning glass, and installed by AT&T in 1983, from New York to Washington, D. C., at 45 megabits per second.

Nowadays optoelectronics has become an emerging new technology. The optoelectronics market is growing every year worldwide, 30% growth every year since 1992.

Optoelectronics allows generating, transporting and manipulating data at very high rate. Main applications of optoelectronics are in the field of communications, including fibre optic communications and laser systems.

However, the applications of optoelectronics extend throughout our everyday lives, including the fields of computing, communication, entertainment, optical information systems, education, electronic commerce, environmental monitoring, health care and transportation.

Optoelectronics is also important in defense applications that include infrared imaging treatment, radar, aviation sensors, and optically guided weapons.