NIT Strategic Workshop Emerging Technologies for Future Optical and Wireless Networks September 8 & 9, 2003 Martin Dawson Martin D. Dawson (MDD) is Professor and Associate Director at Strathclyde University’s Institute of Photonics in Glasgow, UK, which he joined upon its founding in 1996, and where he established and leads the research programmes in III-V semiconductor optoelectronics and devices. He has over 20 years’ research experience in academia and industrial laboratories, covering a broad and unusual combination of topics in ultrafast and solid state lasers, semiconductor spectroscopy and materials science, materials processing, and optoelectronic device design and development. He received the B.Sc. degree (1st Class Honours) in physics and the PhD degree in laser physics from Imperial College, London, in 1981 and 1985, respectively. His PhD degree, supervised by Prof. Wilson Sibbett, FRS, dealt with optical gain switching of GaAs semiconductor lasers, solid-state laser mode-locking and four-wave mixing in semiconductors. From 1985 to 1991, he worked in the United States in the group of Prof. A.L. Smirl, first at North Texas State University and subsequently at the University of Iowa, holding for the initial two years the position of Research Scientist and then the position of Visiting Assistant Professor. Whilst there, he became well-known for his work on femtosecond dye lasers, especially in developing a novel oscillator design which was subsequently commercialised by two companies (Coherent and Quantronix). From 1991 to 1996, he held the position of Senior Researcher at Sharp Laboratories of Europe, Ltd., Oxford, UK, performing basic materials work on AlGaInP semiconductor structures for applications in red diode lasers. The work published in this period is regularly quoted as standard reference literature for this materials system. Since moving to Glasgow, his research interests have encompassed a range of surface-normal device formats, principally in nitrogen-containing III-V semiconductors. Prof. Dawson was an early proponent of the novel alloy GaInNAs for 1.3mm VCSELs, and runs an internationally-recognised activity in this area. He has also pioneered in mode-locking of lasers using semiconductor saturable absorber mirrors, and in vertical external cavity surface-emitting lasers (VECSELs). He established the gallium nitride growth and processing activity at Strathclyde University and leads programmes on microcavities and high-density micro-LED arrays based on this materials system. Associated with this, he took on the practical responsibility in establishing the Compound Semiconductor Technologies Ltd. facility in Glasgow, which has incubated three new companies. He has authored or co-authored over 200 papers in scientific journals and conference proceedings, and holds 11 granted patents. MDD is a Member of the UK EPSRC Peer Review College, and has served EPSRC as Chair or Member of several visiting or review panels. He is a member of the University of Strathclyde’s 12-member University Research Committee. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Physics, is a Senior Member of the IEEE Lasers & Electro-Optics Society (LEOS), and is a Member of the Optical Society of America. He has served the Scottish Chapter of IEEE/LEOS since its inception, as Secretary (1997-1998), Vice-Chair (1998-2000) and Chair (2000 - 2003). He is a member of the LEOS Optical Materials and Processing Subcommittee and the Institute of Physics Quantum Electronics and Photonics Group Committee. More info: Martin Dawson's web site