Welcome to our Sub-Committee Topic Chairs and Poster Session organisers from across the industry
We are pleased to welcome a number of experts to our 2024 Committee, each focused on a particular topic area. We also welcome our Poster Session organisers for 2024. Find out more below.
Telecommunications - Mingming Tan, Research Fellow, Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies, Aston University
Dr Mingming Tan received the Ph.D. degree in electronics engineering from Aston University, UK in 2016. He works as a Research Fellow at Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies (AiPT), Aston University. He has published 87 journal and conference papers in the field of optical fibre communications. He is a Member of Optica. He has been a co-chair of sessions at ICTON, PIERS, and IEEE SUM since 2018, and serves as a guest editor of the journals MDPI Photonics and Applied Sciences.
Photonic Components - Mary McCarthy, Lumentum
Dr Mary Elizabeth McCarthy (she/her) works as Design Authority for Digital Coherent Optical modules in Lumentum (previously Oclaro). Previous experience includes post-doctoral research at Aston University (UK) on optical signal processing to counteract nonlinear transmission impairments in large bandwidth, complex modulation format systems. She has worked for Ericsson in UK and Australia on design, implementation and customer compliance of long haul and metro transport platforms. She completed her PhD in digital chromatic dispersion compensation in Tyndall institute (IRL) in 2009.
Data Centres - Fotini Karinou, Senior Researcher, Microsoft Research
Fotini is a Senior Researcher at Microsoft working on developing novel optical technologies for next generation cloud computing systems and networks. Before joining Microsoft, she was a Senior R&D Engineer at Huawei Technologies Ltd in the Optical & Quantum Lab, in the German Research Centre in Munich, where she worked on optical transmission systems and networks, spanning from high-capacity optical interconnects for datacom, to metro/access, and long-haul coherent systems. In Huawei, she also worked on developing quantum key distribution optical systems and subsystems and physical layer prototypes for quantum communications. She received the Diploma in Electrical and Computer Engineering, with specialization in telecommunications and information theory, and the PhD degree in optical communications focused on spectrally efficient WDM optical interconnect networks with advanced modulation formats, from the University of Patras, Greece, in 2007, and 2012, respectively. She has served as Chair and TPC member in several (OSA, IEEE) conferences in the field of optical communications and is currently serving as Associate Editor for the Journal of Lightwave Technology.
Photonics for RAN - Shabnam Noor, Aston University
SHABNAM NOOR received the B.Sc. degree in electronics and communication engineering from BRAC University, Dhaka, Bangladesh, in2011, and the M.Eng. degree in telecommunications from American International University Bangladesh, Dhaka, Bangladesh, in 2013. She also received her Ph.D. in 2019 from School of Engineering, University of Kent, Canterbury, U.K., before working there as a research associate. She is currently a research associate for the All-Raman optical amplification for next Generation ultra-wideband Optical Networks (ARGON) project at Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies, Aston University, Birmingham, U.K. Her research interests include Ultra-Wideband (UWB) systems and amplification technologies, signal processing for communications and multiplexing techniques for 5G (and beyond) mobile fronthaul.
Free Space Optics - Martin Lavery, Glasgow University
Martin P.J. Lavery is a Full Professor and leader of the Structured Photonics Research Group at the University of Glasgow. He works on applying novel physical phenomena to industry inspired engineering challenges, leading research programs in developing high capacity free-space communication systems that incorporate space division multiplexing, investigating propagation dynamics of structured light in turbulent environments, solar collection optics, and acoustic wavefront shapers. He is currently the coordinator for the EU project SuperPixels, utilizing integrated photonics for sensing and communications applications, and PI on the EPSRC project Pon-HD, developing technologies for cable free passive optical networking, and has been given various awards including Scopus Young Scientist of the Year for Physical Sciences and the Royal Academy of Edinburgh Sir Thomas Makdougall Brisbane Medal.
Quantum Communications - Cathy White, BT
Cathy White is a researcher at British Telecom who is working on integrating and downstreaming quantum information technology for industrial applications. She has studied electronics, physics and quantum physics, and she worked in a variety of different technical roles in software and instrumentation before joining BT in 2011.
Poster Session Organiser - Lakshmi Rajagopal, Early Stage Researcher, BT Applied Research
I am a Marie Curie fellowship based Early-Stage Researcher, pursuing my PhD with BT and University of Birmingham on the “Application of highly precise optical clocks in a telecom network”. Telecom networks need high level of accuracy and synchronization to work effectively. Currently, this is achieved with the help of satellite-based technologies. The next generation of telecom network require precision and stability than ever before, and this is easily achieved in the lab with an optical atomic clock. The challenge is on how to bring this technology out of the lab and utilize it in our telecom infrastructure. . Another dimension of my research work involves investigating wide range of use cases and applications that can be benefitted from these highly precise clocks.
Poster Session Organiser - Anastasiia Vasylchenkova, Associate Editor at Communications Engineering, Springer Nature
I am an Associate Editor for Communications Engineering – part of the Communications journals in Nature Portfolio. I received my BSc and MSc in nuclear physics from the Kharkiv National University, Ukraine in 2014 and 2016, respectively. I received a PhD degree from Aston University, Birmingham, UK, for developing the nonlinear Fourier transform approach for optical communications. For three years, I was a Leverhulme Trust Fellow at Optical Networks Group, University College London, studying ultrawideband communications systems. Beyond research, I am an experienced educator in STEM, educational events manager and designer, and a Fellow of the Higher Educational Academy. I have 10 years of volunteering experience for STEM and photonics communities, including Optica, IEEE and IoP.
