Though on a limited basis Chiral Photonics, Inc. (CPI) was originally structured (1999) around development of innovative products based upon the novel photonic properties of chiral structures - devices having a screw-like (or helical) microstructure providing ability to control and manipulate light and periodically revisits the SBIR arena. Products based on chiral structures offered both performance and cost advantages while also have application to diverse fields such as aerospace, telecommunications, oil and gas exploration and drilling, projection displays, and biological and chemical sensing and analysis. CPI early developed a flexible, continuous twisting process to produce glass fibers with chiral structure, which offered high performance at low cost to the optical telecommunications, and sensing industries CPI's fabrication capabilities allow helices with sub-micron pitch to be precisely imparted to optical glass fibers without the need for lithographic processing and without being limited to photosensitive glasses. Growing out of the fundamental research done at CUNY by the firm's founder, it was demonstrated that lasing at the edge of a photonic stop band in dye-doped cholesteric liquid crystals (CLCs) and developed a fundamental understanding of lasing and light propagation in these chiral structures. CPI developed an optically pumped, polymeric chiral thin film laser based upon these self-assembling, photonic band gap structures. Anchored in this early work, CPI currently designs, develops and manufactures fiber-based optical components and assemblies thereof, for applications ranging from 3D shape sensing, used in minimally invasive surgery, to pump-signal combiners, used in industrial machining, to high bandwidth links, enabling the most advanced submarine communications cables and hyperscale data centers. The firm's development work often now employs optical simulations and modeling, precision microforming of glass, polarization control and advanced optical characterization, packaging and testing to meet exacting performance requirements for deployments ranging from outer space to subsea.
