Lively exchange – the laser community met at ISLC2021
More than 100 international scientists joined the five-day International Semiconductor Laser Conference (ISLC) in Potsdam. Roughly the same number of participants tuned in online on a daily basis.
The conference addressed current developments in semiconductor lasers, amplifiers and LEDs. "We had a packed program with many exciting talks, workshops and discussions," explains Paul Crump. He is head of a lab at the Berlin-based Ferdinand-Braun-Institut (FBH), which organized the conference, and General Chair of ISLC2021. Thanks to the hybrid format, researchers who could not travel in person were also able to attend. "This worked amazingly well and there were almost as many talks and participants as before the Corona pandemic," Paul Crump is pleased to report. "We were fully booked and even had to cancel on other interested parties." The average attendance to the conference – without pandemic-related restrictions – was around 120 to 170 people. This year’s ISLC2021 was also one of the first international conferences to be held – at least partially – back in face-to-face attendance. "We noticed how important personal contact and direct professional exchange is," adds Crump. The parallel exhibition was also completely full. "We are particularly proud to have brought this renowned conference back to Germany for the first time in 20 years – this also shows the strength of optical technologies in the region."
ISLC 2021 – Topics, Awards & Outlook
The program committee had selected the 100 best contributions as conference talks and poster presentations. Moreover, the lifetime achievements and merits of two recently deceased scientists were honored: Prof. Markus-Christian Amann (Walter Schottky Institute of the Technical University of Munich) and Prof. Peter S. Zory (University of Florida). On Wednesday, the IEEE Photonics Society's $400 prize for the best student poster was awarded to Aris Koulas-Simos from TU Berlin for his work on nanolasers.
The conference itself was broadly oriented in terms of topics. Renowned speakers and workshops addressed progress in materials science of UV lasers and LEDs as well as great power scaling capability achieved by edge emitters and lasers based on photonic crystals. Other focal topics included faster, flexible lasers for communications and lasers for quantum applications. Program Chair Akihiko Kasukawa from Furukawa Electric, the only in-person representative from the Asia-Pacific region, was pleased with the lively discussions and numerous advances. "For example, many optimized multi-epi laser structures for power scaling for high-end LiDAR applications were presented, as were novel technologies for efficient beam steering." With the closing of this year's conference, Akihiko Kasukawa also takes over as General Chair from Paul Crump for ISLC2022 in Matsue, Japan: www.islc2022.org
More about the ISLC
With its more than 50 years of tradition and its international audience, the ISLC is one of the most renowned conferences in the field of semiconductor lasers. The venues rotate every two years between the Americas, Asia/Australia and Europe/Middle East/Africa regions. Since its foundation, many new and groundbreaking semiconductor devices have been presented for the first time at this conference. ISLC 2021 and the accompanying exhibition were organized by the Ferdinand-Braun-Institute and supported by the IEEE Photonics Society as technical sponsor.
www.islc2021.org
