Adelphi's state-of-the-art laser optics lab allows undergraduate students the opportunity to become familiar with current optics technology and its applications. Dr. Gottipaty Rao oversees holography research.

One such application is in using bacteriorhodopsin as a recording material for dynamic holographic applications.

For approximately ten years, we have been preparing excellent quality optical holograms using films and plates. Now we are investigating the possible utilization of bacteriorhodopsin (BR) as a recyclable, real-time holographic recording material. BR offers excellent high resolution for holographic recording (better than 5000 lines/mm) which is comparable to or better than the best available emulsions, a wide range of spectral sensitivity (400-600 nm) covering most of the visible part of the electromagnetic spectrum, write and erase timescales in the microsecond range, and millions of write/read operations. This material needs no further processing or wet chemical development procedures after exposure. One additional feature of the BR films is that polarization recording is possible. When fully developed, this technique has applications in optical holography, industry, and defense.


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