OSA Awards Highest Distinction to UC Santa Barbara’s Rod Alferness

The Optical Society (OSA) has awarded its 2018 Frederic Ives Medal/Jarus W. Quinn Prize to Rod Alferness, the Richard A. Auhull professor and dean of the College of Engineering at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Alferness led the charge into the era of optical networks. With other researchers and colleagues at Bell Labs, he investigated ways to harness the power of light for telecommunications, and he now continues to push for the study and development of optics and photonics technologies to usher in future high-performance, energy-efficient devices and telecommunications infrastructure.

His work includes contributions and leadership in the development of integrated optics, high-speed optical modulation and switching, and configurable wavelength-division multiplexing networks that have provided significant economic and societal impact. His research, according to OSA, led to the “early development of titanium diffused lithium niobate waveguide modulators, which are now deployed as the high-speed signal-encoding engine in fiber optic transmission systems around the world.”

Alferness’ efforts have also resulted in the establishment of UC Santa Barbara as a hub for AIM Photonics, a federal and state engineering technology consortium dedicated to advancing the technology and manufacturing of integrated silicon photonics, as well as to the development of the highly skilled workforce necessary to support the emerging industry.

“I am humbled and honored to receive the 2018 Frederic Ives Medal/Jarus W. Quinn Prize from OSA. The society and community that has been my professional home for nearly 45 years,” Alferness said.

Recognizing overall distinction in optics, the Frederic Ives Medal is the highest award of OSA. It was endowed in 1928 by Herbert E. Ives, a distinguished charter member and OSA president from 1924 to 1925, to honor his father who was noted as the inventor of modern photoengraving and for his pioneering contributions to color photography, three-color process printing, and other branches of applied optics.