A Lecture Series Filled with Opportunity
QUT OSA Student Chapter
The graduate students in the school of Optometry and Vision Science at Queensland University of Technology (QUT) have an immense passion in exploring the application of optics in their research activities. With this passion, The Optical Society (OSA) QUT Student Chapter was established in the year 2012. This year QUT OSA Student Chapter organized their first ever OSA lecture series to mark the Centennial year of OSA. This event was a joint collaboration between QUT OSA student chapter and QUT school of Optometry and Vision Science. The objective of the event was to educate and spread the awareness of a wide field of application of optics and light based technologies in science, engineering and other health research. In addition to that, we also wanted to highlight the achievements of our team and the challenges faced by the chapter. These were made clear to the audience in the Chapter President’s welcome speech.
The event witnessed presentations from two notable speakers and was held at the Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation building on 20th April 2016. The first speaker Associate Professor Ian Cowling is from the School of Chemistry, Physics and Mechanical Engineering in the Science and Engineering Faculty at QUT and has worked as an academic at QUT for more than 30 years. His specialty is the detection and measurement of light. Associate Professor Cowling leads the QUT Lighting team in a range of educational, consulting, design and development projects. He set up the NATA accredited QUT Photometric Laboratory in the early 1990s. He established the post-graduate lighting course at QUT in 2004 and oversaw its extension as a course in Hong Kong in 2005. Recently he was awarded a large grant to work on Daylighting design, and he has worked on ultraviolet doses to the eye. Associate Professor Cowling is well-known for his industrial and commercial experience and works on helping research students in connecting their research work with the outside world. He has co-authored many publications and recently his work on “Discomfort glare in open plan green buildings” was published in the Journal of Energy and Buildings. Associate Professor Ian has had considerable experience speaking at both local and international scientific conferences and in his speech titled “How best to collaborate with Industries”, he talked on how he was able to maintain and establish a photometric laboratory and also how to successfully collaborate with industries. His talk provided useful insight to the students who were interested in the same topic.
The second speaker Dr Atanu Ghosh is a Clinical Research Fellow in the Contact Lens and Visual Optics Laboratory, School of Optometry and Vision Science, Faculty of Health, QUT. Dr Ghosh obtained his PhD degree from QUT for his work on “Optical and biomechanical factors associated with near work and myopia” in 2012. His work provided important insights into the potential role of near work in the development of myopia in children. In 2014, Dr Ghosh joined University of Rochester, New York for a post-doctoral fellowship in which he investigated the effect of blur adaptation on human parafoveal vision using an Adaptive Optics Vision Simulator. His research interests include visual optics and myopia, adaptive optics and visual psychophysics, contact lens application in presbyopia and astigmatism and biomechanical aspects of myopia. He has published in various vision and optics journals, and has delivered invited lectures at various symposia. Dr Ghosh’s presentation during this event was on the application of adaptive optics in investigation of vision. He shed light into his two years working experience at the University of Rochester, and he demonstrated how Adaptive optics technology has transformed the world of ocular imaging including applications in retinal photoreceptor imagery and in the study of myopia development/progression.
This first event from QUT OSA student chapter was well appreciated by the audience. There were 40 attendees in the event and we expect it will grow in future events. The audience included undergraduate students, postgraduate students, and faculty staff from QUT School of Optometry and Vision Science, as well as students from University of Queensland (UQ) OSA student chapter. The audience also had an opportunity to have a one-on-one conversation with the guest speakers after the event which was followed by lunch and refreshments sponsored by the student chapter.
There will be at least 2 lecture series per year. This event would not be possible without the generous support from Optical Society OSA Centennial Special Events Grant that was awarded to our chapter. We would also like to extend our gratitude to QUT School of Optometry and Vision Science and the Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation at QUT for their help in organizing the event.
About us: The QUT OSA student chapter was established in 2012 through the passion of its first President Dr Adnan Khan. The association is run by Optometry graduate students. Professor David Atchison, the head of Visual and Ophthalmic Optics Research Group, Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation (IHBI) is the advisor of the chapter. Dr Uchechukwu Levi Osuagwu, PhD student at IHBI and QUT School of Optometry and Vision Science, is the current Chapter president. He coordinates the activities of the chapter, keeps deadlines and inspires the chapter members to get involved.
