Highlights

Photon as a working fluid for heat engines

  • A scalable platform for near-field thermophotovoltaics Nature Communications (2020) [PDF]
  • Produces more power from low-grade waste heat using photons with a chemical potential Nano Letters (2018) [PDF]
  • High-power-density near-field thermophotovoltaic Nano Energy (2017) [PDF]
  • A thermal emitter helps to break the Shockley-Queisser limit International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer (2013) [PDF]

Photonics meets electronics

  • DC voltage conversion mediated by photons Nature Communications (2021) [PDF]
  • An electronic circuit makes a thermal system self-sustaining Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2019) [PDF]

Rewriting Kirchhoff's law of thermal radiation

  • Strong nonreciprocal thermal radiation measured in experiments for the first time Science Advances (2022) [PDF]
  • Adjoint Kirchhoff’s law that works for all thermal emitters Physical Review X (2022) [PDF]
  • New way to do angular control for emissivity and absorptivity Physical Review Applied (2021) [PDF]
  • Nonreciprocity from topologically-protected material Nano Letters (2020) [PDF]
  • A permanent magnet brings complete violation of Kirchhoff’s law Optics Letters (2019) [PDF]

Breaking the blackbody limit in near-field heat transfer

  • Near-field heat transfer can be nonreciprocal when looked closely Physical Review B (2020) [PDF]
  • Coupling of phonon and plasmon polaritons provides a strong enhancement ASME Journal of Heat Transfer (2017) [PDF]
  • >10X the blackbody limit measured in doped-Si system Applied Physics Letters (2016) [PDF]

Structured order brings coherence to thermal radiation

  • An atomic-scale arrangement induces temporal order in thermal fluctuations ACS Photonics (2021) [PDF]
  • Strong coupling brings bright enhancement: 1 + 1 > 2 ACS Photonics (2015) [PDF]
  • Making metals highly emissive Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer (2014) [PDF]

Full List

^corresponding author, *equal contribution

    2024

  1. Jafari Ghalekohneh, S., Du, C., and Zhao, B., “Controlling The Contrast Between Absorptivity and Emissivity in Nonreciprocal Thermal Emitters,” Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 124, p. 101104 (2024). [PDF] [Editor's Pick] [Featured Article]

    2. 2023

  2. Wu, S., Jian, R., Zhou, L., Tian, S., Luo, T., Cui, S., Zhao, B., and Xiong, G., "Eggshell Biowaste-Derived Flexible and Self-Cleaning Films for Efficient Subambient Daytime Radiative Cooling," ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces, Vol. 15, pp. 44820-44826 (2023). [PDF]
  3. Du, C., and Zhao, B., "Controlling the ENZ Profile for Broadband Nonreciprocal Thermal Emitters with High Contrast Between Emissivity and Absorptivity," Proceedings of the 10th International Symposium on Radiative Transfer, (2023). [Link][PDF]
  4. Shayegan, K., Biswas, S., Zhao, B., Fan, S., and Atwater, H.A., "Direct observation of the violation of Kirchhoff’s law of thermal radiation," Nature Photonics, Vol. 17, pp. 891-896 (2023). [Link][PDF]
  5. Guo, C., Asadchy, V., Zhao, B., and Fan, S., "Light Control with Weyl Semimetals," eLight, Vol. 3, p. 2 (2023). [PDF]

    6. 2022

  6. Jafari Ghalekohneh, S. and Zhao, B., "Nonreciprocal Solar Thermophotovoltaics," Physical Review Applied, Vol. 18, p. 034083 (2022). [PDF] [Priority application number US 63/330,426] [Media report from UH news, Interesting Engineering, PVbuzz Media, eeDesignIt, AZO CleanTech, Mirage News, Innovation News Network, Bioengineer.org, Science Daily, Techi AI, BusinessNews, Houston News, The Science Times, Innovation News Network, List Solar, TechiAzi, Smartech Energy, New Jersy Updates, TechNewsBoy, Engineers Forum, My Crush, Technology Networks, The Brighter Side, Atlantis Rising, Mercom India, Lab Roots, Innovation Toronto, Brightly News, India Education Diary, Innovation Map, Nasdaq, Aljazeera.net, BusinessNews, HydrogenFuelNews, List Solar, PV Magazine, and Optics.org]
  7. Shayegan, K.J., Zhao, B., Kim, Y., Fan, S., and Atwater, H.A., "Nonreciprocal Infrared Absorption via Resonant Magneto-Optical Coupling to InAs," Science Advances, Vol. 8, p. eabm4308 (2022). [PDF]
  8. Guo, C., Zhao, B., and Fan, S., "Adjoint Kirchhoff’s Law and General Symmetry Constraints of All Thermal Emitters," Physical Review X, Vol. 12, p. 021023 (2022). [PDF]
  9. Audhkhasi, R., Zhao, B., Fan, S., Yu, Z., and Povinelli, M., "Spectral Emissivity Modeling in Multi-Resonant Systems using Coupled-Mode Theory," Optics Express, Vol. 30, pp. 9463-9472 (2022). [PDF]
  10. Jian, R., Wu, S., Zhao, B., and Xiong, G., "Tunable multi-peak perfect absorbers based on borophene for high-performance near-infrared refractive index sensing," Optical Materials, Vol. 131, p. 112751 (2022). [PDF]
  11. Chorsi, H., Cheng, B., Zhao, B., Toudert, J., Asadchy, V., Shoron, O.F., Fan, S., and Matsunaga, R., "Topological Materials for Functional Optoelectronic Devices," Advanced Functional Materials, p. 2110655 (2022). [PDF]
  12. Park, Y., Zhao, B., and Fan, S., "Reaching the Ultimate Efficiency of Solar Energy Harvesting with a Nonreciprocal Multijunction Solar Cell," Nano Letters, Vol. 22, p. 448 (2022). [PDF]
  13. Yang, C., Zhao, B., Cai, W., and Zhang, Z.M., "Mid-Infrared Broadband Circular Polarizer Based on Weyl Semimetals," Optics Express, Vol. 30, p. 3035 (2022). [PDF]

    14. 2021

  14. Zhao, B., Wang, J., Zhao, Z., Guo, C., Yu, Z., and Fan, S., "Nonreciprocal Thermal Emitters Using Metasurfaces with Multiple Diffraction Channels," Physical Review Applied, Vol. 16, p. 064001 (2021). [PDF]
  15. Zhao, B.*, Assawaworrarit, S.*, Santhanam, P., Orenstein, M., and Fan, S., "High-Performance Photonic Transformers for DC Voltage Conversion," Nature Communications, Vol. 12, p. 4684 (2021). [PDF][US Patent No. 11,923,873]
  16. Zhao, B., Song, J.H., Brongersma, M., and Fan, S., "Atomic-Scale Control of Coherent Thermal Radiation," ACS Photonics, Vol. 8, p. 872 (2021). [PDF]
  17. Park, Y., Asadchy, V., Zhao, B., Guo, C., Wang, J., and Fan, S., "Violating Kirchhoff's Law of Thermal Radiation in Semitransparent Structures," ACS Photonics, Vol. 8, p. 2417 (2021). [PDF]

    18. 2020

  18. Zhao, B.*, Guo, C.*, Garcia, C., Narang, P., and Fan, S., "Axion-Field-Enabled Nonreciprocal Thermal Radiation in Weyl Semimetals," Nano Letters, Vol. 20, pp. 1923−1927 (2020). [PDF]
  19. Zhao, B.^ and Fan, S.^, “Chemical Potential of Photons and Its Implications For Controlling Radiative Heat Transfer,” Annual Review of Heat Transfer, Vol. 23, pp. 397-431 (2020). [PDF] [Invited]
  20. Bhatt, G.R., Zhao, B., Roberts, S., Datta, I., Mohanty, A., Lin, T., Hartmann, J., St-Gelais, R., Fan, S., and Lipson, M., "Integrated Near-Field Thermo-Photovoltaics for On-Demand Heat Recycling," Nature Communications, Vol. 11, p. 2545 (2020). [PDF]
  21. Guo, C., Zhao, B., Huang, D., and Fan, S., "Radiative Thermal Router Based on Tunable Magnetic Weyl Semimetals," ACS Photonics, Vol. 7, p. 3257 (2020). [PDF]
  22. Asadchy, V., Guo, C., Zhao, B., and Fan, S., "Sub-Wavelength Passive Optical Isolators Using Photonic Structures Based on Weyl Semimetals," Advanced Optical Materials, p.2000100 (2020). [PDF]
  23. Santhanam, P., Li, W., Zhao, B., Rogers, C., Gray, D., Jahelka, P., Atwater, H., and Fan, S., "Controlling the Dopant Profile for SRH Suppression at Low Current Densities in λ ≈ 1330 nm GaInAsP Light-Emitting Diodes," Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 116, p. 203503 (2020). [PDF]
  24. Fan, L., Guo, Y., Papadakis, G., Zhao, B., Zhao, Z., Buddhiraju, S., Orenstein, M., and Fan, S., "Nonreciprocal Radiative Heat Transfer Between Two Planar Bodies," Physical Review B, Vol. 101, pp. 085407 (2020). [PDF]
  25. Papadakis, G., Buddhiraju, S., Zhao, Z., Zhao, B., and Fan, S., "Broadening Near-Field Emission for Performance Enhancement in Thermophotovoltaics," Nano Letters, Vol. 20, pp. 1654−1661 (2020). [PDF]

    26. 2019

  26. Zhao, B.^, Shi, Y., Wang, J., Zhao, Z., Zhao, N., and Fan, S.^, "Near-Complete Violation of Kirchhoff’s Law of Thermal Radiation with a 0.3 T Magnetic Field," Optics Letters, Vol. 44, No. 17 (2019). [PDF]
  27. Zhao, B., Buddhiraju, S., Santhanam, P., Chen, K., and Fan, S., "Self-Sustaining Thermophotonic Circuits," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 116, No. 24 (2019). [PDF]
  28. Ono, M., Santhanam, P., Li, W., Zhao, B., and Fan, S., "Experimental Demonstration of Energy Harvesting from The Sky Using The Negative Illumination Effect of a Semiconductor Photodiode," Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 114, p. 161102 (2019). [PDF] [Highlighted by journal]
  29. Zhao, N., Zhao, Z., Williamson, I., Boutami, S., Zhao, B., and Fan, S., "High Reflection from a One-Dimensional Array of Graphene Nanoribbons," ACS Photonics, Vol. 6, pp. 339-344 (2019). [PDF]
  30. Papadakis, G., Zhao, B., Buddhiraju, S., and Fan, S., "Gate-Tunable Near-Field Heat Transfer," ACS Photonics, Vol. 6, pp. 709-719 (2019). [PDF]

    31. 2018

  31. Zhao, B., Santhanam, P., Chen, K., Buddhiraju, S., and Fan, S., "Near-Field Thermophotonic Systems for Low-Grade Waste-Heat Recovery," Nano Letters, Vol. 18, pp. 5224-5230 (2018). [PDF] [Reported by Nature Photonics]
  32. Chen, K., Zhao, B., and Fan, S., "MESH: A Free Electromagnetic Solver for Far-Field and Near-Field Radiative Heat Transfer for Layered Periodic Structures," Computer Physics Communications, Vol. 231, pp. 163-172 (2018). [PDF]

    33. 2017

  33. Zhao, B., Chen, K., Buddhiraju, S., Bhatt, G., Lipson, M., and Fan, S., "High-Performance Near-Field Thermophotovoltaics for Waste Heat Recovery," Nano Energy, Vol. 41, p. 344 (2017). [PDF]
  34. Zhao, B.^, Guizal B., Zhang Z. M., Fan S., and Antezza M.^, "Near-field Heat Transfer Between Graphene/hBN Multilayers," Physical Review B, Vol. 95, p. 245437 (2017). [PDF]
  35. Zhao, B.^, and Zhang, Z.M.^, "Resonance Perfect Absorption by Exciting Hyperbolic Phonon Polaritons in 1D hBN Gratings," Optics Express, Vol. 25, p. 7791 (2017). [PDF]
  36. Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Perfect Absorption with Trapezoidal Gratings Made of Natural Hyperbolic Materials," Nanoscale and Microscale Thermophysical Engineering, Vol. 21, p. 123 (2017). [PDF] [Selected as the cover of the issue]
  37. Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Perfect Mid-Infrared Absorption by Hybrid Phonon-Plasmon Polaritons in hBN/Metal-Grating Anisotropic Structures," International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, Vol. 106, p. 1025 (2017). [PDF] [ESI Highly Cited Paper]
  38. Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Enhanced Photon Tunneling by Surface Plasmon-Phonon Polaritons in Graphene/hBN Heterostructures," ASME Journal of Heat Transfer, Vol. 139, p. 022701 (2017). [PDF]
  39. Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Design of Optical and Radiative Properties of Solids," Handbook of Thermal Science and Engineering: Radiative Heat Transfer, F.A. Kulachi (ed.), Springer Nature, Chap. 25, pp. 1023-1068 (2017). [PDF] [Link]

    40. 2016

  40. Watjen, J.I., Liu, X.L., Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "A Computational Simulation of Using Tungsten Gratings in Near-Field Thermophotovoltaic Devices," ASME Journal of Heat Transfer, Vol. 139, p. 052704 (2016). [PDF]
  41. Watjen, J.I.*, Zhao, B.*, and Zhang, Z.M., "Near-field Radiative Heat Transfer Between Doped-Si Parallel Plates Separated by a Spacing down to 200 nm," Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 109, p. 203112 (2016). [PDF]

    42. 2015

  42. Zhao, B., Skurai, A., and Zhang, Z.M., "Polarization Dependence of the Reflectance and Transmittance of Anisotropic Metamaterials," Journal of Thermophysics and Heat Transfer, Vol. 30, pp. 240-246 (2015). [PDF]
  43. Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Strong Plasmonic Coupling Between Graphene Ribbon Array and Metal Gratings," ACS Photonics, Vol. 2, pp. 1611-1618 (2015). [PDF]
  44. Liu, X.L., Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Enhanced Near-Field Thermal Radiation and Reduced Casimir Stiction Between Doped-Si Gratings," Physical Review A, Vol. 91, p. 062510 (2015). [PDF]
  45. Zhao, B., Zhao, J.M., and Zhang, Z.M., "Resonance Enhanced Absorption in a Graphene Monolayer by Using Deep Metal Gratings," Journal of the Optical Society of America B, Vol. 32, pp. 1176-1185 (2015). [PDF] [OSA Publishing Top Downloads in June 2015]
  46. Sakurai, A., Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Effect of Polarization on Dual-Band Infrared Metamaterial Emitters or Absorbers," Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer, Vol.158, pp. 111-118 (2015). [PDF]
  47. Liu, X.L., Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Blocking-Assisted Infrared Transmission of Subwavelength Metallic Gratings by Graphene," Journal of Optics, Vol. 17, p. 035004 (2015). [PDF]

    48. 2014

  48. Sakurai, A., Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Resonant Frequency and Bandwidth of Metamaterial Emitters and Absorbers Predicted by an RLC Circuit Model," Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer, Vol. 149, pp. 33-40 (2014). [PDF]
  49. Zhao, B., Zhao, J.M., and Zhang, Z.M., "Enhancement of Near-Infrared Absorption in Graphene with Metal Gratings," Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 105, p. 031905-1/4 (2014). [PDF] [ESI Highly Cited Paper]

  50. Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Study of Magnetic Polaritons in Deep Gratings for Thermal Emission Control," Journal of Quantitative Spectroscopy and Radiative Transfer, Vol. 135, pp. 81-89 (2014). [PDF] [Best Poster Award at the 2013 IMECE]

    51. 2013

  51. Zhao, B., Wang, L.P., Shuai, Y., and Zhang, Z.M., "Thermophotovoltaic Emitters Based on a Two-Dimensional Grating/Thin-Film Nanostructure," International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer, Vol. 67, pp. 637-645 (2013). [PDF] [ESI Highly Cited Paper]
  52. Liu, X.L., Zhao, B., and Zhang, Z.M., "Wide-Angle Near-Infrared Polarizer with Extremely High Extinction Ratio," Optics Express, Vol. 21, pp. 10502–10510 (2013). [PDF]