Dr. Ying-Lung Daniel Ho received his BSc degree in Electrical Engineering from the National Taipei University of Technology in Taiwan and the Ph.D. degree in Quantum Photonics from the University of Bristol. His doctoral dissertation investigated the method of designing efficient single-photon sources for quantum information applications. He was employed as a Postdoctoral Researcher and then a Research Fellow in Prof. John Rarity‘s group. His work as a Research Fellow (Researcher Co-Investigator and Co-Investigator) under the EPSRC Programme Grants (EP/M009033/1 and EP/P034446/1) has led research in direct laser writing using two-photon polymerisation in the Quantum Engineering Technology Labs, and he is also a Visiting Lecturer at the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering in Bristol.

In September 2019, he started a position as a Vice-Chancellor’s Senior Fellow in Physics and Electrical Engineering, after a career in Quantum Photonics research at the University of Bristol. Currently, he is the head of the Hybrid Nanophotonic Engineering Laboratory (HNEL) and leads an EPSRC Programme grant (EP/V040030/1) of £379,763 (80% FEC) to develop and conduct Nanophotonics research, which focuses on a comprehensive investigation into the fundamentals and applications of 3D nanophotonics in artificially structured materials. The project is in collaboration with research partners (QET Labs, University of Bristol and ORC, University of Southampton) and industrial partner (Oxford Instruments Plasma Technology) to develop novel sensors, biomimetic structures, nano-lasers, and ultrafast optical switches and devices for quantum technology.

Daniel's research is concerned with both the theory and application of artificially structured electromagnetic materials for photonic engineering and quantum technologies.

(i) Nanofabrication Techniques: The realization of full 3D confinement of photons in photonic crystals (PhCs) has proven to be quite challenging. I designed and fabricated an inverse crystal using two-photon lithography followed by CVD backfilling. Backfilling used a low-temperature CVD process demonstrating a single-inversion technique; this provides reliable fabrication of full photonic bandgap materials confining light in 3D leading to a wide range of future photonic applications such as sensors, biomimetic structures, nano-lasers, and quantum light sources.

(ii) Optical Characterisation: Another aspect of my research concerns the angle-resolved light scattering characterisation technique using Fourier image spectroscopy (FIS) which measures the spectra across an image formed at the back focal plane of the objective lens, capturing the scattering pattern of the device under study. I have characterised structures in transmission and reflection modes using an in-house built FIS to visualise the photonic band structure.

(iii) Numerical Modelling: Modelling based on the electromagnetic simulation software (Finite-Difference Time-Domain, FDTD and plane-wave expansion, PWE) can assist in the design of devices compared with angle-resolved light scattering characterisation, which enables an estimation of device quality at each fabrication step. I have successfully demonstrated design and simulation of light confinement in diamond lattice structures based on removing or adding materials to create low-index or high-index cavities. Additionally, the complete PBGs of inverse RCDs formed in low refractive index contrast (1.9:1) via chalcogenide materials, were experimentally measured with results compared with numerical simulations. These results demonstrated that, the threshold of the lowest refractive index contrast can support a complete PBG, thus validating predicted data using the topology optimization approach.