Industrial Affiliates Symposium 2024

More than 230 attendees from across the world traveled to CREOL in late February and early March for the annual Industrial Affiliates Spring Symposium. Lasers were the focus this year, with short courses, guest lectures, and student talks lined up in a busy two-day schedule. After a warm welcome from UCF Provost Michael Johnson, CREOL Dean David Hagan gave an overview of CREOL and its plans for continued growth. Keynote speakers included Mark Spencer, Director of the Joint Directed Energy Transition Office, and Mike Wardlaw, Program Manager at the Office of Naval Research.

The Symposium brings together members of the CREOL Industrial Affiliates (IA) program in an intentional fusion of academia, industry, and government. CREOL professor Peter Delfyett gave a short course “Introduction to Lasers” and professors Rodrigo Amezcua Correa and Guifang Li both gave presentations. Two CEOs of leading global optics and photonics associations, Kent Rochford of SPIE and Liz Rogan of Optica, presented information and analysis in a session on current and future industry trends.

The Symposium concluded with the recognition of the poster presentation winner, Shaghayegh Yaraghi, CREOL’s Student of the Year, Dmitrii Konnov ‘21MS ‘24PhD, and Distinguished Alumnus of the Year, Vadim Smirnov ‘00MS.

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The 2025 Industrial Affiliates Spring Symposium is scheduled for April 17 and 18.