Publications

22. F. Bertot, A. Tomasino, C. Y. Tam, W. Withayachumnankul, and I-C. Benea-Chelmus, “Patch-array antennas for narrowband and large-aperture field-resolved detection of terahertz signals in hybrid silicon–organic photonic chips”,  https://pubs.aip.org/aip/app/article/11/9/096102/3403406

Francesco Bertot and colleagues demonstrate integrated terahertz detectors combining patch-array antennas with hybrid silicon–organic photonic circuits. The antennas concentrate terahertz fields into a nanoscale slot, where an electro-optic polymer transfers the signal onto a telecom optical probe, enabling field-resolved detection. Compared with bowtie antennas, patch arrays deliver stronger responses at selected frequencies, with measured enhancements of approximately 3 dB at 250 GHz and 8 dB at 500 GHz. Spatial measurements also reveal improved tolerance to off-center illumination, while the spectral shape remains largely unchanged across the measured beam positions. These findings clarify the trade-off between narrowband sensitivity and broadband detection, providing practical guidance for the design of next-generation integrated terahertz receivers.

21. Z. Basiri, A. Tomasino, G. Jülg, A. Lanfranchi, and I-C. Benea-Chelmus, “Metasurface-controlled high-speed tunable external cavity lasers”, https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aee1791

Zahra and team demonstrate the first integration of a resonant electro-optic metasurface into an external-cavity diode laser, enabling compact, motion-free, and high-speed control of the laser frequency and output power.

20. A. Gaier, J. Liu, E. Mironova, G. Jülg, and I-C. Benea-Chelmus, “Hz-resolution wide-span photonic integrated terahertz signal analyzer”, https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.03442

HYLAB team introduces an integrated photonic signal analyzer that bridges millimeter-wave and terahertz electronics with optics. Their thin-film lithium niobate chip performs broadband wireless-to-optical conversion from 80 to 400 GHz, enabling compact, high-precision measurements of terahertz spectrum and its phase noise.

19. T. Zhang, A. Garcia Primo, J. Liu, A. Gaier, I.-C. Benea-Chelmus, “Reconfigurable Single-Ring Photonic Molecule on Lithium Niobate”, https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.06637

Tianyi and team demonstrate a reconfigurable photonic molecule in a single thin-film lithium niobate ring resonator. They show that light can write, erase, and rewrite a long-lived photorefractive grating inside the resonator, enabling programmable GHz-scale mode splitting and tunable millimeter-wave-to-optical transduction around 107 GHz.

18. A. Tomasino, A. Shams-Ansari, M. Loncar, I.-C. Benea-Chelmus, “Large area photonic circuits for terahertz detection and beam profiling“, Light: Science & Applications 15 (1), 9, link

Alessandro and team demonstrate plug-and-play coherent terahertz detectors at 500 GHz, a 6G band. They argue that the low loss of thin film lithium niobate platform is a key asset to enable integration of  a two-dimensional array of terahertz antennas with the photonic circuit to conceptualize, implement and demonstrate selectivity to this desired 6G band through a novel type of quasi-phase matching, robustness to illumination and beam profiling capabilities.

17. A. Gaier, K. Mamian, S. Rajabali, Y. Lampert, J. Liu, L. Magalhaes, A. Shams-Ansari, M Loncar, I-C Benea-Chelmus, “Wireless millimeterwave electro-optics on thin film lithium niobate“, https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.04585

Aleksei and team report on the first ever resonant electro-optic conversion across the millimeterwave band. 

16. Y. Lampert, A. Shams-Ansari, A. Gaier, A. Tomasino, S. Rajabali, L. Magalhaes, M. Loncar, I.-C. Benea-Chelmus, “Photonics-integrated terahertz transmission lines“, Nature Communications 16 (1), 2025 link

Yazan and team publish the first-ever photonics integrated terahertz transmission lines that operate up to 3.5 THz.

15. I.-C. Benea-Chelmus, J. Faist, A. Leitenstorfer, A. S Moskalenko, I. Pupeza, D. V Seletskiy, K5 L Vodopyanov, “Electro-optic sampling of quantum light“, Optica 12 (4), 546-563, link

Together with colleagues we put together a review on the basics and applications of electro-optic sampling for both classical and quantum sensing. 

14. S. Mason, I.-C. Benea-Chelmus, “Hybrid silicon-organic Huygens metasurfaces for phase modulation“, Optics Express 31, 22 (2023).

Sydney publishes her computational study on Hybrid silicon-organic Huygens metasurface for phase modulation.

13. S. Rajabali, I.-C. Benea-Chelmus, “Present and future of terahertz integrated photonic devices”, APL Photonics 8, 8 as a featured article, selected for AIP’s Publishing showcase (2023).

Shima and Cristina publish an invited paper about the current state of the art and milestones ahead for miniaturised terahertz devices co-habiting with integrated photonic circuits.

12. I.-C. Benea-Chelmus and A. Tomasino, “Resolving subcycle signatures: Perspective on hallmarks of terahertz field metrology”, Frontiers in Photonics 4 (2023)

Alessandro and Cristina publish a perspective on Hallmarks of terahertz field metrology, and the advantages offered by possibilities to resolve sub-cycle signatures down to the quantum level

11. A. Herter*, A. Shams-Ansari*, F.F. Settembrini, H.Warner, J. Faist, M. Loncar and I.C. Benea-Chelmus, “Terahertz waveform synthesis from lithium niobate integrated circuits”, Nature Communications 14, 11 (2023)

In collaboration with colleagues at Harvard and ETHZ, we demonstrate on-chip terahertz waveform synthesis from lithium niobate circuits. Read EPFL press release here.

10.  V. Ginis*, I.C. Benea-Chelmus*, J. Lu, M. Piccardo and F. Capasso, “Resonators with tailored optical path by cascaded mode conversions”, Nature Communications 14, 495 (2023).

In collaborators from VU Brussels, Harvard and IIT, we demonstrate resonators with tailored optical path by cascaded mode conversions. 

9. I.-C. Benea-Chelmus, S. Mason, M. Meretska, D. Elder, D. Kazakov, A. Shams-Ansari, L. Dalton and F. Capasso, “Gigahertz free-space electro-optic modulators based on Mie resonances”, Nature Communications 13, 3170 (2023)

In collaboration with colleagues at Harvard and University of Washington, we demonstrate metasurface modulators reach gigahertz speeds. Read Harvard SEAS press release here.

8. Electro-optic spatial light modulator from an engineered organic layer

I.-C. Benea-Chelmus, M. Meretska, D. Elder, M. Tamagnone, L. Dalton and F. Capasso,

US patent application

Nature Communications 12, 5928 (2021)

Harvard SEAS press release: “Bridging optics and electronics“

Top 25 most read papers in Nature Communications in 2021.

 

7. Terahertz generation from thin film lithium niobate platform

A. Herter*, A. Shams-Ansari*, F.F.Settembrini, H. Warner, J. Faist, M. Loncar and I.-C. Benea-Chelmus,

CLEO US postdeadline paper SF1B.3 (2021)

 

6. Electro-optic coherent interface for ultra-sensitive intracavity electric field measurements at microwave and terahertz frequencies

I.-C. Benea-Chelmus*, Y. Salamin*, F. F. Settembrini, J. Fedoryshyn, W. Heni, D. Elder, L. Dalton, J. Leuthold and J. Faist,

Optica (2020)

 

5. Compact and ultra-efficient broadband terahertz field detector

Y. Salamin*, I.-C. Benea-Chelmus*, J. Fedoryshyn, W. Heni, D. Elder, L. Dalton, J. Faist and J. Leuthold,

Nature Communications 10, 5550 (2019) , ETH News