Award: Premio Justiniano Casas de Investigación en Imagen Óptica (9th Edition)
Dr. Albert Van Eeckhout Alsinet has received the “Justiniano Casas Research Award in Optical Imaging” (9th Edition) for his work related to his doctoral thesis, conducted within the Optics Group, titled “Polarimetric Methods for Image Enhancement in Biological Applications,” supervised by Dr. Juan Campos and Dr. Ángel Lizana. Congratulations, Albert!
Award: Premio Investigador Postdoctoral RNO2024
During RNO2024, Dr. Iván Montes received the Postdoctoral Researcher Award for his oral presentation titled “Experimental Errors in a Mueller Matrix Imaging Polarimeter Based on Liquid Crystal Variable Retarders.” Congratulations, Iván!
Conference: Reunión Nacional de Óptica RNO2024
From July 3rd to 5th, the Optics Group had the pleasure of attending the National Optics Meeting (RNO2024) in Murcia. It was an excellent opportunity to learn about the current state of research and outreach in Optics and Photonics in Spain, and to connect with researchers and colleagues from all over the country. In addition to enjoying the talks, posters, and plenary sessions, we had the opportunity to share some of our research.
Outreach Activity: Campus Itaca 2024
From 26 June to 16 July, the Optics Group opened their laboratories to high school students as part of the Campus Ítaca 2024 educational programme. The students explored the fundamentals and practical uses of optics, including color, polarization, diffraction, lasers and holograms. They also had the opportunity to interact with the researchers.
Conferences: Atomtronics
V. Ahufinger and A. Pérez-Obiol have attended the Atomtronics workshop in Benasque (from 19 May to 1 June 2024).
V. Ahufinger presented an invited talk about the use of a lattice of rings loaded with ultracold atoms carrying orbital angular momentum to mimick a paradigmatic one dimensional topological model, the Su-Schieffer-Heeger. A. Pérez-Obiol gave a contributed talk about simulation of lattice Hamiltonians on digital quantum computers, in particular on devising adiabatic and variational algorithms to solve the Fermi-Hubbard and the nuclear shell model on qubits.
Conferences: Non-equilibrium phenomena in strongly correlated ultracold matter
V. Ahufinger has presented an invited talk about Hilbert space fragmentation in the Non-equilibrium phenomena in strongly correlated ultracold matter workshop held in Erice from 9 May to 15 May 2024.
Scholarship: Beca LúZete SEDOPTICA
M. Canabal-Carbia ha sido una de las 5 personas agraciada con la beca LúZete de SEDOPTICA. Esta beca ayuda a financiar parcialmente la participación de jóvenes investigadores e investigadoras en congresos o eventos científicos de ámbito nacional o internacional enmarcados en todas las áreas de Óptica y Fotónica.
Scholarship: SPIE Optics and Photonics Scholarship
M. Canabal-Carbia has been awarded a 2024 Optics and Photonics Scholarship by SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics, for potential contributions to optics, photonics, or a related field.
Conference: SPIE Photonics Europe
From 7 to 11 of April 2024, I. Montes-González and M. Canabal-Carbia assisted to the SPIE Photonics Europe conference in Strasburg (France).
They were delighted to show some of their recent research and connect with researchers of Photonics around Europe. They presented some of their work related to the use of polarimetric techniques emphasizing its potential to improve the visualization and identification of tissue in brain samples and the optimization and calibration of a Mueller matrix imaging polarimeter.
Spring school: EuroPhotonics Spring School
V. Ahufinger has given a seminar about Designing topology in photonic systems in the EuroPhotonics Spring School 2024, which has taken place on board of the Silja Serenade ferry from Helsinki (Finland) to Stockholm (Sweden) from 3 to 5 April 2024.
Outreach Activity: Saló de l’Ensenyament
On the last day of the Education Fair (Saló de l’Ensenyament), Sunday, March 17, the Optics Group of the Department of Physics organized an activity from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. in which various optical phenomena – colors, diffraction, fluorescence, reflection, and polarization – were explained, and experiments with light were conducted to discover what it is and how it behaves.
Outreach Activity: Dissabtes de la Física
On Saturday 2 March, the Optics Group opened their laboratories to high school students as part of the Dissabtes de la Física program. The students learned about the principles and applications of optics, such as polarization, diffraction, lasers and holograms. They also had the opportunity to interact with the researchers and ask them questions about their work.
Outreach Activity: 11F, the International Day of Women and Girls in Science
On Tuesday 13 February, we received, at the Optics Group, the visit of students of the primary school of Bellaterra. M. Canabal and I. Estévez gave some workshops on light, including visible and ultraviolet light, lasers and fluorescence and phosphorescence phenomena.
Conference: SPIE Photonics West
From 27 January to 1 February 2024, J. Campos, I. Estevez and M. Canabal assisted to the #SPIEBiOS conference at the Photonics West Conference in San Francisco.
They were delighted to show some of their recent research. They presented some of their work related to the use of polarimetric techniques emphasizing its potential to improve the visualization and identification of tissue in brain samples and the optimization and calibration of a Mueller matrix imaging polarimeter.
Kick-off meeting: The national FASLIGHT network
D. Viedma and V. Ahufinger presented the research lines of the Optics group in the kick-off meeting of the national FASLIGHT network, which took place on January 18 and 19, 2024 at the School of Physics of the University of Salamanca, bringing together more than 65 researchers from the 15 nodes that make up the network.
Article selected as the journal cover for Nanophotonics
The recent article by D. Viedma, V. Ahufinger and collaborators from the University of Aveiro, titled “Topological n-root Su-Schrieffer-Heeger model in a non-Hermitian photonic ring system“, has been featured on the cover of Volume 13, Issue 1 of Nanophotonics.
This achievement highlights the interest of the presented results, as well as the quality of the research performed. Congratulations to the authors!
Seminar: “Optical polarization: going from 2D to 3D”
Prof. Miguel A. Alonso, professor at École Central de Marseille and the Institut Fresnel, as well as professor of optics at the University of Rochester and senior scientist in the Laboratory for Laser Energetics. Room: C3b/002. Edifici C (Ciencias). Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona.
PhD Thesis Defense
Dr. Eulàlia Nicolau has successfully defended her PhD Thesis, titled: «Ultracold atoms in coupled ring potentials and flat-band lattices».
Congratulations Dr. Eulàlia Nicolau!!