Wim Bogaerts selected as Optica Fellow 2024

Optica's Board of Directors elected Professor Wim Bogaerts, Photonics Research Group - imec, for his seminal contributions to design methodologies for silicon photonics and to research on programmable photonic circuits.

Wim Bogaerts is professor in Silicon Photonics, and has been a pioneer in this field for 25 years, starting up this work at Ghent University and IMEC during his PhD. While working on the fabrication processes and building blocks for these new chips, he also developed the software methodologies to design complex optical circuits. To bring these tools to the market, he and a few colleagues founded the spin-off company Luceda Photonics in 2014. Since 2017 Wim has been researching the new field of programmable photonics, supported by a consolidator grant of the European Research Council.

The Board of Directors of Optica (formerly OSA), Advancing Optics and Photonics Worldwide, recently elected 129 members from 26 countries to the Society’s 2024 Fellow Class. The new class of Fellows were selected for their outstanding contributions to research, business, education, engineering and service to Optica and the Optica community.

Fellows are Optica members who have served with distinction in the advancement of optics and photonics. The Fellow Members Committee, led by Chair Ofer Levi, University of Toronto, Canada, reviewed 216 nominations submitted by current Fellows. The Committee extends its thanks to all of this year’s nominators and references. As Fellows can account for no more than 10 percent of the total membership, the election process is highly competitive. Candidates are recommended by the Fellow Members Committee and approved by the Awards Council and Board of Directors.