Researcher Profiles

Richard Quimby

Richard Quimby (rsquimby@wpi.edu) conducts experiments to understand the fundamental processes occuring in optical amplifiers, such as Erbium and Ytterbium doped fibers, and to spectroscopically evaluate other materials doped with rare earth ions such as fluoride glasses, sulfide glasses, and transparent glass ceramics. His contributions toward understanding how to quantify radiative and nonradiative processes in these materials has led to significantly improved experimental techniques to measure absorption and emission cross sections. This widely used calibration technique allows material researchers to identify processes that contribute to an inefficient gain in optical amplifiers. His research is in part driven by desire to obtain ultra wide band amplifiers and lasers (up to 40 THz) for the telecommunication industry. Professor Quimby has received support from the U.S. Air Force, GTE, Corning, Draper Labs, the Naval Research Labs, and Boston University

Alex Zozulya

Alex Zozulya (zozulya@wpi.edu) is exploring means to turn recent breakthroughs in cold-atom technology into high-precision instrumentation. By taking advantage of the short characteristic wavelength of coherent atoms (- 1 nm), scientists hope to enhance the precision of interferometric devices such as atomic clocks and gravitometers by 1000 fold. Professor ZozuIya arrived at WPI in 1998 after spending six years at JILA (Boulder, Colorado) and fourteen years at the Lebedev Physics Institute (Moscow). He is a world-renowned optical theorist, with over 100 publications in areas such as photo refraction, nonlinear optics, and cold-atom physics. Using the theory of the interaction of light with matter, Professor Zozulya is exploring ways to design atom-optics devices. He is also investigating the unusual propagation characteristics of light through "holy" fibers, and applications of the ultra-slow speed of light in cold atoms. The Army Research Office is supporting this work.