15.02.21 – Professor Tobias J. Kippenberg at EPFL’s School of Basic Sciences has been awarded the 2021 Robert W. Wood Prize from The Optical Society.

Established in 1975, the Wood Prize is named after renowned physicist Robert W. Wood, who who made pivotal contributions to the field of optics. It recognizes an “outstanding discovery, scientific or technical achievement or invention in the field of optics”, measured mainly by whether it impacts the field in a way that “opens a new era of research or significantly expands an established one”. The prize is endowed by Xerox Corp.

The Optical Society (OSA) has announced the 2021 recipient of the R.W. Wood Prize is Professor Tobias J. Kippenberg at EPFL’s School of Basic Sciences (Institute of Physics). Professor Kippenberg “is honored for pioneering contributions to the realization of chip-scale optical frequency combs.”

In 2007, Kippenberg and his team discovered the ability of optical microresonators to generate optical frequency combs via parametric interactions. This discovery showed that as an alternative to the use of mode-locked lasers, a CW laser can be converted into a broadband frequency comb via nonlinear wave mixing, overcoming passive cavity dispersion.

Kippenberg has led the field in novel microfabrication techniques, both in crystalline microresonators and through his introduction and perfection of the photonic damascene process in the silicon nitride platform.