The Spotlight Report

Dr. Travis Sawyer, Professor of Optical Sciences, Biomedical Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Health Sciences, and Medicine, was kind enough to speak with me about how multimodal optical imaging can improve early cancer diagnosis in ovarian and esophageal cancers. Travis discusses existing diagnostic methods, the need for improved techniques and why OCT, two-photon imaging, and fluorescence hold potential for cancer diagnostics. He expanded upon how these methods can be combined in a compact physical form via endocscopy, and the challenges with combining imaging results, and the future for the field. I hope you enjoy as much as I did; Dr. Sawyer is advancing not only a highly interesting field, but one that holds a potential for improving humanity in a very tangible way.

4) Texture Analysis of OCT in ovarian tissue: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1361-6560/aaefd2/meta

5) Evaluation of illumination system uniformity for wide-field biomedical hyperspectral imaging :https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2040-8986/aa6176/meta

6)Fluorescence and Multiphoton Imaging for Tissue Characterization of a Model of Postmenopausal Ovarian Cancer: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/lsm.23251

7) Milford Track: https://www.newzealand.com/us/feature/milford-track/

I spoke with Hyemin Yoo, who recently completed her dissertation on a combined Sine Condition/Deflectometry test method for optical alignment. Hyemin discusses the methodology in detail, starting with an introduction to the background of optical alignment, the sine condition test, and deflectometry. She then explores how to define a robust test approach, including simulations and as built test methods. Her approach, termed SCT+, provided an excellent optical alignment performance, in simulated and real world tests, of tens of nanometers. I hope you enjoy.

Eric Goodwin wrote the Field Guide to Interferometric Testing, and now is the Director of Optical Sciences at Nikon Research Corporation of America. In his work, he has undoubtedly worked on cutting edge optical systems and products, providing him a unique insight into delivering reliable solutions at the forefront of optical products. Eric discusses his deep background in optical metrology and testing, and additionally shares insights regarding managing complex optics projects and teams. Lastly, I had the pleasure of sharing stories with Eric regarding our own experiences working with Dr. Barrett and Dr. Greivenkamp.

References:

1) Field Guide to Interferometric Optical Testing

2) Nikon Optics Research

2) Campbell, E W, Phillion, D W, and Sommargren, G E. Sub-nanometer interferometry for aspheric mirror fabrication. United States: N. p., 1999. Web.

3) An example of the use of point diffraction interferometry

Joel Berkson sat down to discuss forming his optical metrology company, Fringe Metrology. Joel discusses the ups and downs of creating a startup, why more people should try it, and how to evaluate a product market fit before diving in head first. Joel expands on how they have refined Fringe Metrology's product fit and offerings to meet market needs, particularly in the area of metrology for larger, often rougher surface optical elements. This was a great conversation, an it was a delight to hear Joel's passion and candid reflection on his experience forming a business.

Links:

This week I spoke with Donn Silberman, who first entered optics in 1976 as a high school student, getting involved in astronomy. Donn shared his insights from his career in optics, in not only engineering but also sales and management. Additionally, he discussed founding the Optics Institute of Southern California and his outreach work. We talked about how he has fostered outreach to get others of all ages interested and involved in optics and how other can also join in on these endeavors. It was a pleasure to speak with Donn and to hear his continued enthusiasm and work to get more people interested in optics!

Relevant Links:

Donn's Bio at OSSC: https://ossc.clubexpress.com/content.aspx?page_id=22&club_id=239344&module_id=61827

Donn's Website (with links to other resources!): https://donn601.wixsite.com/opticsage

Donn's Talk at 2024 Photonics West: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/americom-optics_join-us-for-this-important-panel-discussion-activity-7151260300296556544-CYaH?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_android

Youtube Video version: https://youtu.be/EncOAKDRwaU?si=8K_qMA3Izmb2ohES

ELEO Forum: https://community.eleoptics.com/t/dr-eva-acosta-on-visual-optics-wavefront-coding-and-imaging-through-cataracts/360?u=lrgraves

In this episode, I sat down with Heejoo Choi. Heejoo recently won the Kevin P. Thompson Optical Design Innovator Award He won the award for an innovative UV cross-dispersion space telescope and engineering of a laser-truss LBT metrology system. He is currently an assistant research professor at the James C. Wyant College of Optical Sciences and an Optical Scientist at the Large Binocular Telescope.

Heejoo discusses the motivations for why innovative designs were required in the LBT metrology system as well as the Hyperion cross-dispersion space telescope. He goes into what drove the design choices and how that impacted the system performance overall. These are both cutting-edge optical designs so I am sure the audience will have a lot to explore in both.

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Youtube video version here.

Resources:

1. Andrew Rakich, Heejoo Choi, Christian Veillet, John M. Hill, Matthieu Bec, Yang Zhang, Trenton Brendel, Breann Sitarski, Michael Gardiner, Dae Wook Kim, Stephanie Rodriguez, "A laser-truss based optical alignment system on LBT," Proc. SPIE 11445, Ground-based and Airborne Telescopes VIII, 114450R (13 December 2020); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2558013

2. Heejoo Choi, Isaac L. Trumper, Yi-Ting Feng, Hyukmo Kang, Joel Berkson, Haeun Chung, Erika T. Hamden, Dae Wook Kim, "Long-slit cross-dispersion spectroscopy for Hyperion UV space telescope," J. Astron. Telesc. Instrum. Syst. 7(1) 014006 (12 March 2021) https://doi.org/10.1117/1.JATIS.7.1.014006 

 Link to read paper ungated