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22 January 2010
2010 John Tyndall Award Winner Announced
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Lyndsay Meyer
The Optical Society
+1.202.416.1435
lmeyer@osa.org
2010 John Tyndall Award Winner Announced
Randy Giles Receives Award for Seminal Contributions to Advanced Lightwave Communications Networks
WASHINGTON, Jan. 21 – The Optical Society (OSA) and the IEEE Photonics Society are pleased to announce that Randy Giles, director of the optical subsystems and advanced photonics department at Bell Labs Alcatel-Lucent, is the recipient of the 2010 John Tyndall Award. Giles is being recognized for “seminal contributions to advanced lightwave communications networks.”
Giles has been contributing to the field of optical communications for more than 30 years. During the course of his career, he has been recognized for his outstanding contributions to advancing optical networking. In 2008 Giles was honored by the Finnish Government as Millennium Technology Prize Laureate for development of the erbium-doped fiber amplifier. He received the Fraunhofer Award & Burley Prize from OSA in 2004 and the Discover Award in 2000 for invention of the MEMS-based optical crossconnect switch. He also became a Fellow of OSA and Bell Laboratories in 2001.
The Tyndall Award recognizes Giles’ numerous contributions to the field. Among his most significant accomplishments are the erbium-doped fiber amplifier, fiber Bragg grating-based subsystems and MEMs crossconnects, including the first practical optical switch.
“Randy Giles’ work has paved the way for countless advances in optical communications – advances that provide the basis for next-generation networks,” said OSA CEO Elizabeth Rogan. “As bandwidth drivers increase, breakthroughs enabling faster speeds and connectivity are made possible in part because of Randy’s pioneering research, and the goal of honoring him with the Tyndall Award was to recognize these career successes.”
Giles will be presented the award in March during the plenary session and award ceremony of the 2010 Optical Fiber Communication Conference and Exposition/National Fiber Optic Engineers Conference (OFC/NFOEC) held in San Diego.
“We look forward to honoring Randy’s achievements at this year’s OFC/NFOEC,” said Rich Linke, IEEE Photonics Society executive director. “His research has been the impetus for new discoveries, and it is a perfect fit that we’re able to recognize his contributions at a conference of his peers and colleagues and those who have been able to take his pioneering work and apply it to their areas to further enhance optical communications.”
The Tyndall Award is the highest recognition in the optical telecommunications community and is co-sponsored by OSA and the IEEE Photonics Society. First presented in 1987, the Tyndall Award recognizes an individual who has made pioneering, highly significant, or continuing technical or leadership contributions to fiber optics technology. Corning, Inc. endows the award, a glass sculpture that represents the concept of total internal reflection. The award is named for the 19th century scientist who was the first to demonstrate a phenomenon of internal reflection.
About OSA
Uniting more than 106,000 professionals from 134 countries, the Optical Society (OSA) brings together the global optics community through its programs and initiatives. Since 1916 OSA has worked to advance the common interests of the field, providing educational resources to the scientists, engineers and business leaders who work in the field by promoting the science of light and the advanced technologies made possible by optics and photonics. OSA publications, events, technical groups and programs foster optics knowledge and scientific collaboration among all those with an interest in optics and photonics. For more information, visit www.osa.org.
About IEEE Photonics Society
The IEEE Photonics Society is the photonics branch of the world's largest professional science and engineering society. We are dedicated to promoting the photonics profession through the publication of the highest-impact journals in the field, the sponsorship of hundreds of high quality conferences around the world and the recognition of outstanding contributions in the field. Our activities span the full scope of science, technology and applications in the photonics field. For more information please visit: www.PhotonicsSociety.org.
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