Centre of Light for Life

📢 The Centre is delighted to share that Kishan Dholakia has been nominated for the prestigious SPIE Board of Directors 2024. If elected, Kishan aims to support SPIE in its endeavours to promote Optics and Photonics on a global scale. One of Kishan’s key motivations as potential future Director is expanding SPIE’s global reach 🌏. Our Centre has grown tremendously, comprising of a diverse group of members, and maintains strong collaborations with The University of St Andrews in Scotland, and other leading national and international Universities. The SPIE Election opens today 🗓 (June 21st). We would like to call on all SPIE members to cast their vote in this important election. New members can sign up here: https://lnkd.in/gndgjeNg. Kishan is recognised together with the 2024 Nominees for SPIE Officers and Board of Directors (https://lnkd.in/gYSz7BEq). Please have a look at the Bios/Statements of the other distinguished nominees. We will be posting regularly leading to the close of the election period, follow for more updates! SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing (IPAS) University of Adelaide

A Career-Defining Experience It was amazing spending 2 months at the Centre of Light for Life with the brilliant and cheerful people working there. These 2 months, at the University of Adelaide have given me profound insights into actual research - what it means to ideate, postulate, test, fail, refine, and then repeat the process to 'discovery'. Want to hugely thank Kishan Dholakia, Avinash Upadhya, and everyone else who guided me and shared their knowledge, allowing me to peek into the beautiful world of optics. Special thanks to Dr. Shanti Bhattacharya for providing this surreal opportunity. Learning from field leaders, I delved into the basics of beam shaping and the creation and tuning of Bessel beams, as well as implemented deconvolution techniques on real images of biological tissues taken by light sheet fluorescence microscopy methods. Here's to continuous learning and discovery!

🌟 Exciting Announcement! 🌟 We are thrilled to share our recent involvement in an "Expert Recommendation" published in Nature Reviews Physics, aimed at advancing the field of speckle metrology. In optics, speckle arises when a laser beam scatters, creating a unique granular interference pattern. This pattern holds valuable information about the laser, scatterer, and environment properties, enabling precise measurements with remarkable precision. Our recommendation focuses on selecting optimal scattering objects for specific measurements and outlines a method to characterise measurement system sensitivity, debunking common misconceptions in the field. This collaborative effort between University of St Andrews and Centre of Light for Life was authored by Dr Morgan Facchin, Saba Khan, Kishan Dholakia and Graham Bruce. Subscribers can access the full article at Nature Reviews Physics: https://lnkd.in/eXpNrSyv. Free-to-read version is available here: https://rdcu.be/dOjjU. We are looking forward to advancing the frontier of speckle metrology together! 🚀 #Optics #SpeckleMetrology #NatureReviewsPhysics #Research #Science #Innovation University of Adelaide, Faculty of Sciences, Engineering and Technology, Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing (IPAS).

I'm really pleased to share that I will be a Chief Investigator at the newly announced @Australian Research Council Training Centre in Current and Emergent Quantum Technologies (CE-QuTech). The aim is to provide technical and leadership skills to the next generation of quantum technology leaders in biology, engineering, and physics.   Led by the University of Adelaide in collaboration with RMIT University and the The University of Queensland, the Training Centre brings together ARC Centre of Excellences: the ARC Centre for Quantum Biology, ARC Centre of Excellence in Optical Microcombs for Breakthrough Science (COMBS) and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems.   Congratulations to all involved including Glenn Solomon, Arnan Mitchell, Andreas Boes, Andrew White, Jacquiline Romero, Halina Rubinsztein-Dunlop, Brant Gibson, Andrew Greentree, Jared Cole, Yan Jiao, Jiawen Li, Katharina Richter, Giuseppe Carlo Tettamanzi, Tyler Neely, Abel Santos and Warwick Bowen.   And our many industry partners including Robert Scholten (MOGLabs), Paul Butler (Analog Quantum Circuits), James Rabeau (ColdQuanta Australia), Martin O'Connor (QuantX Labs), Sander Dorenbos (Single Quantum) and Niccolo Somaschi (Quandela).    https://lnkd.in/gMYd5BE2 Centre of Light for Life | SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics | University of St Andrews | Graham Bruce

Chris Perrella presented at last week's Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing (IPAS) weekly seminar. His talk covered two key areas of his research: 🔬Optical tweezers to measure oocyte health (a work in collaboration with Kylie Dunning's team) ✨Speckle (interference) patterns to make extremely precise measurements Chris continues to do amazing work in our team, follow for more exciting updates! 🔔 Faculty of Sciences, Engineering and Technology | University of Adelaide

Last week, we hosted the National Youth Science Forum (NYSF) as part of the Optica student chapter. 🔬 At our Centre of Light for Life labs, they saw demos of incredible advances in imaging and optics technologies, such as quantum imaging (Zane Peterkovic), optical trapping (Aman Punse), levitated optomechanics (Damien Raynal), Raman spectroscopy (Ané Kritzinger), and light sheet microscopy (Ramses Eduardo Bautista Gonzalez). Their tour also included various groups from the Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing (IPAS): 💡 Prescott Environmental Luminescence Laboratory (PELL), which conducts novel fluorescence research and its possible applications in mining and extra-terrestrial exploration. ⏱ Precision Measurement Group, where they learned about atomic clocks and the crucial role of accurate time-keeping in today's society. We hope the tour motivated and inspired the next generation of young researchers in STEM 👨🔬 👩🔬 . Our team is passionate about science communication🎙and always open to outreach programmes 😁 Science & Technology Australia | University of Adelaide | Faculty of Sciences, Engineering and Technology 📸 : Gabriel Britto Monteiro, Ramses Eduardo Bautista Gonzalez, Zane Peterkovic

Our PhD students Alexander Trowbridge, Ramses Eduardo Bautista Gonzalez, and Gabriel Britto Monteiro had a blast at The Australian National Fabrication Facility (ANFF) Microengineering Winter School at the University of South Australia. They spent four days learning about the fantastic fabrication capabilities of ANFF South Australia. The course included a series of lectures and practicals covering: - Deposition of metals onto substrates, photolithography, and both wet and dry methods for etching - The importance of microfluidic devices and their broad range of applications - Characterisation of samples using optical and electron microscopy 📸: Gabriel Britto Monteiro

I had an absolute blast last week being a part of Brighton Secondary School’s Thrive Careers Week as a panellist talking about STEM career pathways. We fielded engaging and fun questions from the students including: - What does the future climate for job opportunities in STEM look like? - What work environment is most common for careers in STEM? - What educational background is expected if you want a career in STEM? Hopefully we were able to give the students insight into the STEM life, and fingers crossed encourage some students to peruse a STEM pathway! Events like these are invaluable - I wish I had something like this while I was in school! Thanks to my fellow panellists Sarah Scholten, Tara Pukala, Kelsi Dodds, and Wayne Maloney. Super big thanks to Jessica Bohorquez A. for the invitation to be a part of the Science & Technology Australia #SuperstarsOfSTEM Panel! University of Adelaide, Faculty of Sciences, Engineering and Technology | Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing (IPAS), Centre of Light for Life | Australian Institute of Policy and Science #TallPoppy | #STEM

Thrilled to be in Amsterdam and present our collaborative research at the annual meeting of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology (ESHRE)! If you want to learn more about our use of light to reveal the inner workings of the embryo, check out our papers in this area: 📸 Digital holographic microscopy for measuring dynamics of intracellular refractive index: https://lnkd.in/gyEDgi9E 🌈 Hyperspectral microscopy for detecting embryo aneuploidy: https://lnkd.in/gMPnX_rj 🔬 Phasor-based hyperspectral light sheet imaging to generate 3D maps of metabolism within the embryo: https://lnkd.in/gDc3Teiz Want to learn more about different label free imaging techniques and what they can reveal? Check out our recent review article in an imaging special edition in Biology of Reproduction: https://lnkd.in/gk46bjXF Robinson Research Institute, University of Adelaide | Centre of Light for Life | Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing (IPAS) | University of St Andrews | Vrije Universiteit Brussel | UNSW 📷 credit: Brett Nixon

We were delighted to host Brandon Cochenour from the Office of Naval Research Global (ONR Global). He had a tour of our lab facilities and overview of the exciting research our group is carrying out. We also brought him over to have a look at Optofab Adelaide and meet other groups from the Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing (IPAS). Thanks for visiting, Brandon! University of Adelaide | Faculty of Sciences, Engineering and Technology