annual report - the international society for optics and...
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Annual Report
September 2012 to October 2013
Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies SPIE Student Chapter
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Chapter Overview
The Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies (AIPT) SPIE Student Chapter was established on
the 17th
of August 2012. The chapter consists mostly of PhD students and a few MSc. students
from the Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies, Aston University Birmingham, United
Kingdom. The main objective of forming the student chapter is to create a platform for students to
interact and work together on various activities as it helps to build team work, communication and
leadership skills in them. Since its inception, the chapter has been involved in many activities such
as fresher’s fair, welcome meeting, photonics laboratory tour, AIPT student conference and
education outreach training.
AIPT SPIE Chapter Members
The chapter officials were appointed based on the interest shown by students who signed up to be
members, although in subsequent years, the officials will be elected by the members. The current
members of the chapter are:
Name Position Email
Professor David Webb Chapter Advisor [email protected]
Ada Abang President [email protected]
Srikhant Sugavana Vice President [email protected]
Adedotun Adebayo Secretary [email protected]
Ehikioya Obode Treasurer [email protected]
Adenowo Gbadebo Member [email protected]
Simon Rommel Member
Nikita Tarasov Member [email protected]
Zhijun Yan Member [email protected]
Changle Wang Member [email protected]
Dianabasi Akpan Member
Albert Chukwuma Member
AIPT SPIE Chapter Activities
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The AIPT SPIE student chapter has organised several events involving both the students and staff
of AIPT since its establishment. These activities which will be further explained below include:
Freshers fair
AIPT SPIE chapter welcome meeting
Photonics laboratory tour
Visiting lecturer talk
1st AIPT student conference
Education outreach training
Fresher’s Fair
The AIPT SPIE student chapter had a stand at the Aston University Fresher’s fair organised on the
30th
of September 2012. The event was a good opportunity to inform new students of our
existence, the benefits of being a member of the society and also the numerous activities we
planned to organise. We also had posters that showcased the different uses and importance of the
field of optics and photonics. Lots of PhD, MSc and some undergraduate students showed interest
and signed up to be members. All students who visited our stand were given freebees. A snap shot
of the AIPT SPIE stand was taken before the event and is shown in fig. 1.
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Fig. 1 AIPT SPIE Stand at Aston University’s fresher’s fair
AIPT SPIE chapter welcome meeting
As a follow-up to the fresher’s fair, the AIPT SPIE student chapter organised a welcome meeting
for all members and potential members of the society. It was the first formal meeting of the
society. The benefit of the society was further explained to everyone, the proposed activities for
the chapter were discussed and new ideas were welcomed. Refreshments were served at the end of
the meeting and snap shots of the event are shown in fig. 2.
Fig. 2 AIPT SPIE welcome meeting
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Photonics Laboratory Tour
On the 20th
of November 2012, the SPIE and OSA Student Chapters of the AIPT organised a
laboratory tour for chapter members and engineering students in the Aston University Engineering
and Applied Science Faculty. The six different laboratories visited by students are listed below.
1. Polymer draw tower hosted by Ehikoya Obode
2. Polymer FBG fabrication and sensing hosted by Ada Abang
3. Advanced silica FBG setup hosted by Adenowo Gbadebo
4. State of the art optical instruments hosted by Srikanth Sugavanam
5. Silica UV grating fabrication and sensing hosted by Dotun Adebayo and Zhinun Yan
6. Femtosecond laser hosted by Graham Lee
Some of the pictures taken during the lab tour are shown in fig. 3.
Fig. 3 Photonics laboratory tour
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Lab tour feedback from MSc. student
“I really appreciate the effort and time taken to organise the event and I would like to thank
sincerely the organisers. I personally found the presentations extremely useful and relevant to my
studies. I believe such events are of great importance to introduce students to the scientific life and
to improve connections between PhD students.”
Visiting Lecturer Talk
As part of the AIPT graduate school program, the AIPT SPIE student chapter sponsored the
lecture from Rachael Wong using its SPIE visiting lecturer travel grant. The lecture which was
held on the 9th of January 2013 was on ‘Publishing in Nature Photonics Journal’. The talk
highlighted the requirements and procedure for a paper to be accepted by the journal for
publishing. Rachael Wong also spoke about the requirements for other Nature Publishing Group
journals and a photo of her presentation is shown in fig. 4.
Fig. 4 Lecture presentation by Rachael Wong
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1st AIPT Student conference
The Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies (AIPT) hosted its first student conference titled
'Photonics as an enabling technology – scientific perspectives, industrial applications' at Aston
University, from the 4th
to the 6th
of September 2013. This event was organized by three of its
Ph.D. students Miss. Ada Abang, Mr. Adenowo Gbadebo, and Mr. Srikanth Sugavanam, in co-
ordination with Ph.D. student Miss. Felicity McGrath of Imperial College, London. The event was
supported by the AIPT, professional societies SPIE and OSA, and also by Aston University spin-
off Astasense. The aim of the conference was to highlight the powerful enabling role that
photonics plays in today's technological arena, and the entrepreneurial opportunities that it
presents.
The three day event was attended by over fifty doctoral students and post-doctoral researchers
from universities all over the UK and companies in the photonics industry. The panel of speakers
included both active researchers in the field, and also industry representatives. The talks were
equally divided between discourses on state of the art, industry prospects and general guidance to
aspiring scientists building a career towards full-time research. The session was formally opened
by Prof. David Webb of Aston University, who highlighted the research activities carried out at
the AIPT. Prof. John Dudley of the University of Franche' Comte, France, talked about the
exciting field of nonlinear fibre optics, and how it is paving the way to revealing new physics. In a
separate talk, he also shared his collective experience in the world of scientific research, and
advised students on how to make the most of available resources and opportunities.
Along similar lines, Prof. Andrew Ellis (AIPT) talked about the trials and tribulations of research
in a competitive field like telecommunications. A glimpse of state of the art in the area of infrared
nanophotonics was given by Dr. Alfredo De Rossi from Thales Research. Prof. Henry Kapteyn of
the University of Colorado gave a very interesting talk on table-top X-ray lasers. For aspiring
academics, Dr. Tatiana Habruseva gave a very informative presentation about funding
opportunities available for early career researchers. The role of photonics in biomedicine was
highlighted by Dr. Annamaria Cucinotta of the University of Parma, who talked about biomedical
applications of microstructured optical fibres. From the viewpoint of industry, Dr. Graeme
Malcolm, CEO of M-squared lasers emphasized the need for advances in photonics technology in
application areas like energy and healthcare, while Dr. Loyd McKnight talked about the activities
of the premier research institute Fraunhofer in the UK, which is known for its strong ties with
industrial R&D. Fig. 5 shows a snap shot of some lecture sessions.
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Fig. 5 Lecture presentations during 1st
AIPT student conference
Audience participation was encouraged, and to this end oral and poster presentation sessions were
organized. The emphasis was on communication of ideas to a diverse scientific audience. Mr.
Robert Woodward of Imperial College won the best oral presentation, and Mr. Samuel Bateman
of University of Bath won the award for the best poster and they both received gifts as shown in
fig. 6.
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Fig. 6 Best oral and poster award winners, presented by conference chair (Graham Lee)
Conference events also included an exhibition of research T&M equipment from leading
companies, where the delegates directly interacted with industry representatives to find custom
solutions for their projects. Fig. 7 shows a snap shot of the exhibition floor.
Fig. 7 SPIE sponsored industry exhibition at 1st
AIPT student conference
Social events of the conference included a dinner session for the delegates at the ICC Birmingham
as shown in fig. 8 and a trip to Sir Isaac Newton's Woolsthorpe manor near Grantham, Leicester
as shown in fig. 9.
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Fig. 8 AIPT Conference Dinner
Fig. 9 Snapshot taken at visit to Newton’s village, birth place of Sir Isaac Newton
Comments from Organisers
Says Ms. Ada Abang, president of the SPIE chapter of the AIPT - "The event was indeed a
success as all the participants were really impressed with the level of planning and organisation in
all aspects of the conference and were looking forward to coming around again for many such
events. We hope that we will be able to deliver a better conference in subsequent years to come by
learning from the mistakes made and improving on the level of organisation carried out at our first
conference".
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Says Mr. Adenowo Gbadebo, “Organising the event was very interesting and engaging; a lot of
lessons were learnt. It was great to see our efforts come together at the end of it all to bring the
idea of a student focused industrial conference to life. The positive feedback from all the
attendees, exhibitors, speakers and students alike was absolutely encouraging. It makes organising
another conference in the not too far future a good idea.”
Outreach Training Program
The AIPT SPIE student chapter applied for the Education Outreach grant and was awarded $3000.
This fund was used to purchase the Photonics Explorer kit manufactured by the Photonics
Explorer Team, B-Phot, Department of Applied Physics and Photonics, Vrije Universiteit Brussel
(VUB), Brussel, Belgium. School teachers around the West Midlands of United Kingdom, where
the AIPT SPIE student chapter is located, were invited to partake in a 2 hour training event and
they were given the Photonics explorer kit for free. The training was carried out by Amrita Prasad,
CEO - EYESTvzw (Excite Youth for Engineering Science and Technology). Fig. 10 is a snap shot
of the lecture presentation and figure 11 is the boxes of the kit distributed to teachers.
Fig. 10 Outreach training lecture presentation by Amrita Prasad
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Fig. 11 Photonics training kit given to teachers
The training was carried out for 10 teachers from 8 different schools in the West Midlands of the
UK. The schools that took part in the training event are listed below.
1. Landau Fort Academy, Tamworth, Staffordshire
2. Grace Academy Coventry
3. Aston Engineering Academy Birmingham
4. King Edward High school Birmingham
5. Springwell Community College Derbyshire
6. Holy Trinity School Birmingham
7. Cockshut Hill School Birmingham
8. Holy Head School Birmingham
Fig. 12 and 13 shows the teachers studying the photonics explorer kit manual and trying out
different experiments.
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Fig. 12 Teachers studying photonics explorer kit manual and trying out experiments
Fig. 13 Teachers carrying out different experiments
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Feedback from a Science Teacher who attended the training
I would like to thank you for the training and resources you gave us yesterday evening. I have
shown the content of the box to members of the science department and they were as impressed as
I was at the quality and amount of equipment – having all the resources in groups of ten makes
such a difference for hands on physics in the classroom.
I have just finished my first lesson using some of the photonics resources. My year ten students
were really enthused by the LED arrays and fibre optic cables, and were fully engaged in making
codes to send down the optic fibre. I am already looking forward to the next time I can use the
resources in the Photonics explorer pack.
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Financial Breakdown
The financial activities carried out by the AIPT SPIE student chapter is shown in table 1 for
incoming fund and table 2 for expenses made.
Table 1 Incoming funds received by the AIPT SPIE student chapter
Incoming Funds
S/N Description Amount
1 SPIE chapter activity grant £304.8
2 Industry Initiative grant £909.09
3 SPIE Education outreach grant £1876.52
Total £3090.41
Table 2 Expenses made by the AIPT SPIE student chapter
S/N Events Description Expenses
1 Fresher’s Fair Freebees, tableware, etc £61
2 Welcome meeting Refreshments at meeting £43.88
3 AIPT Conference AIPT SPIE chapter website
hosting
£80
Poster Printing £40
Lunch for industry exhibition
session
£380
Conference registration fee for 8
sponsored student
£400
4 Education Outreach
Training
Photonics explorer kit £1775
Duracell 9V Batteries for kit £59.94
Coffee and snacks during training £22.68
Total expenses £2862.5
Outstanding balance £227.91
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Conclusion
The Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies SPIE Student Chapter will continue to remain an
active student society. We are looking forward to the next year and we are confident that it will be
another successful year as we hope to improve on the various activities we have had in the
previous year. We are particularly looking forward to reaching out to more schools in the United
Kingdom with the outreach education grant as this is helping to promote the field of optics and
photonics.
We thank the SPIE student services once again for their support in all the activities we have had
throughout our first year and we look forward to working with them in the coming year.