Our goal is to sample nonequilibrium dynamics in space and time simultaneously.
In recent decades, developments in laser technology have made it possible to measure extremely short events in time by producing pulses as short a few femtoseconds. This technology has unlocked countless insights into the dynamical evolution of systems across physical sciences, life sciences and engineering. Yet the approach is fundamentally limited by diffraction: regardless of the frequency of light used, the achievable spatial resolution is limited to approximately half the wavelength. In practice, this means a frequency-dependent resolution limited to anything from hundreds of nanometers to nearly a millimetre. Our research exploits exotic properties of light – such as evanescent electromagnetic fields – to break this diffraction barrier by up to seven orders of magnitude, enabling real-space and real-time imaging in the micro-, nano- and even atomic scale
