Photothermics

In photothermal techniques, the thermal response of materials to modulated incident light or electromagnetic radiation is measured and analyzed in order to extract information on the physical processes that underly the phenomenon: light to heat conversion via optical absorption, thermal diffusion, thermal expansion, thermovoltaic effects, phase transitions. The non-contact nature of photothermal heat generation has stimulated the development of a plethora of approaches to also measure the involved temperature changes in non-contact ways, allowing to extract optical and thermophysical information on a wide range of materials for the sake of solid state and soft condensed matter investigations.

Guest Editors: Christ Glorieux, Gerry Diebold, and Roman Anufriev