a

r = 1/6, Pe = 0.05

r = 1/3, Pe = 0.07

r = 1/2, Pe = 0.1

Supplementary Figure S1 | Conventional optofluidic waveguides operated at high Pclet numbers. Conventional optofluidic waveguides are operated at high Pclet numbers, which is 100-fold larger than the one demonstrated in this paper. At high-flow-rate, diffusion effect is limited where the liquid medium appears to be homogeneous. (Scale bar: 100 m)

L = 600 m

Supplementary Figure S2 | Simulated diffusions and confocal images of the fluidic profiles of (a) conventional step-index waveguide and (b) the optofluidic waveguide. An argon-ion laser (514 nm) and DPSS-laser (561 nm) are used to obtain the fluorescent images of the core injected flow stream (Red, Rhodamine 6G) and the cladding injected flow stream (Green, Rhodamine B), respectively. At high Pe (r = 1/6 and Pe = 0.05), a step-index waveguide is formed as shown in a. The core and cladding flow streams are distinctive with limited diffusion in the transverse direction. When Pe is reduced by 100-fold (r = 1/6 and Pe = 0.0005), the diffusion between the core and cladding flow streams are significant in both longitudinal and transverse directions as shown in b. As a result, an inhomogeneous optical medium in the optofluidic waveguide is formed.

y1

0
(x0,y0) Incident wave k0 z

y x

Supplementary Figure S3 | Schematic of light propagation in an inhomogeneous layer. Here, a simple 2D case is considered where the refractive index distribution has no variation in the z direction. x0 is the initial location of the waveguide in the x direction while y0 is the vertical location of the central line of the waveguide (assuming the waveguide is symmetric in the vertical direction). Light is injected into the waveguide with wavevector of k0 and incident angle of 0 at the position (xo and y1).

b
Bend

Wavefront

Wavefront

Supplementary Figure S4 | Theoretical explanation of the focusing and interference effect by considering the interference of rays. a, In a graded-index fiber with unidirectional index gradient, the incoming rays from different transverse locations converge to the same spot. The rays have no intersection. b, In an optofluidic waveguide with bidirectional index gradient, the incoming rays converge to different points. The ray trajectories intersect and thus create the interference patterns.