Photonics for a Better World

Who knew … until last year: Three African-American women working — in obscurity — for NASA as mathematicians played a vital role in the mission that sent astronaut John Glenn into orbit around Earth and brought him back again, in 1962. Publication of Margot Lee Shetterly 's book Hidden Figures and the subsequent release of the acclaimed 2016 film brought the story of the important roles played by Katherine Johnson , Dorothy Vaughan , and Mary Jackson to light for the first time for many. Among key findings in a 2017 photonics industry survey, respondents cited higher percentages of men in management and senior academic positions, with the largest gaps in later career. While their story may have been little known for decades, struggles for opportunity and inclusion are familiar to many women and to members of under-represented minorities or other groups working to make a career in a STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) field. Findings on ...

Mars Curiosity Rover scientist Melissa Rice inspires the next generation with talk of exploring the Red Planet: see the video on SPIE. tv [23:55]. (Above, Rice at the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab with a model of the Curiosity.) If it wanted to, NASA’s Mars Curiosity Rover could stretch its 7-foot arm up from its 10-foot-high body and slam-dunk a basketball. Admittedly, it isn’t likely that any of NASA’s Rovers -– cars on Mars, as some call them –- will find any basketball hoops on the Red Planet. But the space agency’s newest robotic Mars explorer, the Curiosity, has found evidence of ancient lakes, captured images that reveal the composition of rocks on the planet’s surface, and done something many of us have done: taken selfies to post on FaceBook. Curiosity’s discoveries are far from over. The robot is just now reaching the foothills of the lofty (5.5 km, or 18,000 feet) Mount Sharp, with its mission to scale the peak and report back about what it finds along the way...

Humans have been improving photography since Aristotle ’s first observation of a pinhole camera in 350 BC, with milestones such as the introduction of the Lumière brothers' panchromatic plate in 1894 and Willard Boyle and George Smith ’s invention of the charge-coupled device (CCD) in 1969. Today, improvements to digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) cameras, which combine optics with digital imaging sensors, have introduced astrophotography to the wider public. Since its establishment in 1990, the Hubble Space Telescope has used astrophotography to render inspiring images of planets, stars, and solar systems. In the photo above, Alexander Stepanenko has used astrophotography techniques to capture the aurora borealis -- the northern lights. The fascinating phenomenon is caused by the collision of solar wind and magnetospheric-charged particles in high-altitude atmosphere. Using a DSLR camera (Nikon D-800), Stepanenko captured the photons and thermal noise of the north...

Guest blog from Ven: Jacqueline Andreozzi , a PhD candidate at Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth College, is blogging from the Biophotonics Summer School on the island of Ven, off the southern coast of Sweden, this week. SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics, and COST, the European Cooperation in Science and Technology, are among sponsors of the school. Also supporting the school are DTU Fotonik, Technical University of Denmark; Lund Laser Centre; NKT Photonics A/S; Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, through its Nobel Institute for Physics; and Thorlabs.     “If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the     work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.” Antoine de Saint-Exupéry         Biophotonics '15 participants arrive by ferry for the summer school week on Ven. This quote, cited in Dr. Eric Swanson...

Bernardo Cesare ’s photo (above) displays granulite rock under a microscope. The picture resembles a piece of stained glass window through sunlight, but it’s just a thin slice of rock 0.03 mm in thickness and 5 mm in size. The rock’s beautiful "interference colors" derive from the interaction of polarized light with the crystalline matter. Cesare is one of 32 contestants for the People’s Choice Award competition in the SPIE International Year of Light Photo Contest. Judges have already chosen three winners, but now it's your turn to choose. SPIE is providing a prize of US $500 to the People's Choice winner. Online voting continues through 15 August. This blog post features entries illustrating science and technology, including Cesare's, above, and four others, below. Future posts will showcase other entries -- follow the blog to catch them all. Of his work, Cesare says on the National History Museum of London website,“My aim is to reveal the ...

We're sure he would have preferred a different path, but the contributions of Omid Kokabee to awareness of scientific responsibility are unmistakable. Last fall, he was named a recipient of the Andrei Sakharov Prize from the American Physical Society, and now the American Association for the Advancement of Science has announced Omid as the winner of the AAAS Scientific Freedom and Responsibility Award for 2015. Kokabee, a laser physicist and a member of SPIE, was imprisoned in his native Iran as he attempted to return to his PhD studies at the University of Texas at Austin after a visit to his family in Tehran, in February 2011. He was accused of conspiring with enemies of Iran, and convicted in a trial in May 2012. He was not allowed to meet with his lawyer. Omid has continued his studies from prison, where he has written papers and submitted abstracts to professional meetings. Of course, he was not allowed to attend to present them. He's also been teaching -- English an...

The great horned owl's eyes are among pheonomena from nature that have helped inspire photonics engineering. Spiders, fireflies, and pythons have all been responsible for inspiring solutions to challenges facing engineers working in light-based science and technology. As Joseph Shaw, director of the Optical Technology Center at Montana State University, put it, “Nature has developed, very cleverly, some lessons on how to create the features that we desire in optical design.” A highlight of the conference on Bioinspiration, Biomimetics, and Bioreplication at SPIE Smart Structures and Nondestructive Evaluation early each year in San Diego is a visit from an animal ambassador and handlers from the San Diego Zoo’s Centre for Bioinspiration . The center’s mission is to advance the creation and development of nature-inspired products and processes that benefit humanity, wildlife, and habitats. Past years’ animal visitors have included: Monty the Python [video 6:46] , w...

To a child with impaired vision, it might seem like magic. You put on the glasses and turn a dial to adjust the lenses to correct the particular refractive error in your own eyes. Voilà! Instant prescription! Instant clear vision! But it’s not magic. It’s photonics. Specifically, these are “instant prescription eyewear” using adaptive optics, techniques that correct optical signals within a particular system. Applications in astronomy provide a good illustration. Light coming in from space to telescopes on Earth is distorted by particles and gases in the atmosphere. Adaptive optics techniques make corrections in the final viewed image, based on analysis of what has caused the distortion, and render a clear image of what’s out there. A student at Bwindi Watoto School in Uganda wears Child ViSion's instant prescription eyewear. Photo courtesy Child ViSion. Joshua Silver, CEO of the Centre for Vision in the Developing World, and Dow Corning are working to bring a...

Advancements in microtechnology, photonic devices, image sensors and illuminators are helping people with speech impairments and other disabilities communicate and experience a greatly enhanced quality of life without the need for bulky head gear or a bite bar. A recent article in SPIE Professional magazine outlines the innovations that Swedish-based Tobii Technology has made with eye-tracking technologies for augmentative communication systems for people with ALS, (Lou Gehrig’s Disease), for example, as well as for applications in auto safety, medical imaging, human psychology research and more. “Assistive technologies and eye tracking make a natural pair to allow people with disabilities to regain independence and maintain communication,” said Henrik Eskilsson , CEO and co-founder of Tobii Technology. Different from eye-recognition technologies in which a device responds to whether a user’s eyes are looking at it or are open or closed, Tobii’s eye-tracking technology en...

First cleaning test on a gilded brass panel of the Florence's Baptistery North Door by Lorenzo Ghiberti. This masterpiece is under restoration at the Opificio delle Pietre Dure in Florence. Lasers are in the news as usual, this time inspiring a list of what Lewis Carroll’s White Queen might have characterized as "six impossible things” to be believed before breakfast. But thanks to optics and photonics, these things are all possible with the help of lasers: (1) Removing layers of pollution from centuries-old decorative plasters as well as marble and bronze statues . Laser techniques development supported by the TEMART and CHARISMA projects at the Istituto di Fisica Applicata ‘Nello Carrara’ – Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (IFAC-CNR) have enabled restoration of such masterpieces as Donatello's Profet Abacuc, the Etruscan masterpiece Arringatore from the Trasimene Lake, wall paintings such as the painting of the Santa Maria della Scala museum complex in Sien...