What is light? Where did light come from, and where is it going? From optical displays and quantum devices to the secret life of lasers, learn about light from leading UBC researchers. On October 17, join UBC Physics & Astronomy in celebrating the UNESCO International Year of Light and the department’s centennial year for a free public lecture and lab tours.
Free registration: https://ubclight2015.eventbrite.com
1:00 – 2:30pm Presentations by
- Lorne Whitehead – Optical displays: seeing is believing
- Harvey Richer – Light from the Universe
- Lukas Chrostowski – Using light for communications
- David Jones – The secret life of lasers
- Jeff Young – Quantum optical devices
2:30 – 4:30pm Lab tours
Selected labs in AMPEL (Advanced Material and Process Engineering Laboratory, 2355 East Mall) with light-related research topics will be open for public visits. Participating labs and topics:
- Flexible Electronics and Energy Laboratory (FEEL): Flexible Solar Cells and Light Emitting Diodes. Solar cells and light emitting diodes have the potential to be printed on rolls of plastic, paper and fabric in future. We will show some prototype flexible organic solar cells and organic light emitting diodes on flexible plastic substrates.
- Ultrafast Spectroscopy Laboratory: Photoemission Spectroscopy of Quantum Materials. At the Ultrafast Spectroscopy Laboratory, we pursue development of new laser sources/technology, –some based in part on femtosecond frequency combs– and then employ of them in innovative and new spectroscopic applications.
- Biophotonics Laboratory: Optical imaging systems for biomedical applications. We will show a multiphoton microscopy system and an optical coherence tomography system.
- Photonics and Nanostructures Laboratory: Optical Microcavities for Engineering the Interaction of Light and Matter. Visitors will see electron microscope images showing a variety of optical microcavities (approximately 100 times smaller than the thickness of a human hair) used to manipulate and characterize individual nanometre-sized particles, and to generate and detect single photons, all on a silicon chip.
- UBC Sustainability Solutions Applied Physics Laboratory (Demos): The physics of colour quality for indoor illumination. If you’ve shopped for light bulbs recently, you may have noticed that there are a lot of options. Retailers often have light bulbs on display, but it’s almost impossible to know how they will make things look in your home, just by looking at the bulb. In this demonstration, we’ll explain the interesting physics behind this and will show some examples.
- Opto-Electronic Laboratory: Optics on a chip. Experimentation with optical circuits implemented using electronic chip manufacturing technology. Applications are for high-speed optical communications and sensors.
- Molecular Mechatronics Laboratory: Solar Rechargeable Redox Flow Battery. An integrated solar cell – battery structure. The design enables higher solar energy storage yields compared to a system of separate solar cells and batteries and is hoped to facilitate wider use of solar power.
