CIOP 2021| Sharing Optics and Photonics with the World

Optics Frontier—The 12th International Conference on Information Optics and Photonics (CIOP 2021) was held during 23-26 July, 2021 in Xi'an, China. Due to the epidemic, after one year's break, CIOP2021 came back to Xi'an to witness the dual harvest of scientific research and friendship in the global optics and photonics fields. More than 900 representatives in the field of optics and photonics from 16 countries all around the world gathered to share their latest research progress online and offline.

With more than 350 in-person and remote invited presentations together with 470 oral and poster presentations throughout the conference, plenary highlights included:

The latest research progress about using metasurfaces to control electromagnetic waves from the team of Prof. Lei Zhou, Fudan University;

The important achievements of Prof. Govind P. Agrawal, University of Rochester, in the field of space division multiplexing of communication systems;

    

The team of Prof. Yu-Ao Chen from the University of Science and Technology of China will gradually achieve the ultimate goal of global quantum communication;

Prof. Daniel Blumenthal of the University of California, Santa Barbara, brought a new generation of photonic integrated ultra-narrow linewidth stabilized lasers;

The team of Prof. Chi-Kuang Sun, Taiwan University achieved clinical in vivo microscopic imaging of melanin distribution in human skin.

Prof. Zhiping (James) Zhou, CIOP 2021 Steering Committee Chair, warmly welcome the attendees from across the globe. “CIOP 2021 has been held for 11 years since 2008. In the past 11 years, CIOP conference has built a platform for close exchanges in the field of optics and photonics, which fully reflects the influence and vitality of the conference.” noted He.

“This is truly an international conference and gathering of leading researchers in optical sciences. I commend the program committee for their vision in assembling the topics, plenary speakers and organizing the sessions that cover such a broad range of research that is very forefront of optics and photonics” stated Prof. James Harris, General Chair of CIOP2021.

“It is very regretful that I was unable to make the plan to join the conference in person and actively participate in the outstanding program in spite of incredible challenges created by Covid pandemic. I am very impressed with the number of invited speakers and extensive attendance by the leading researchers. Hoping the epidemic would end soon and we would meet offline.” said Prof. Xi-Cheng Zhang, Technical Program Co-chair of CIOP2021.

At the opening ceremony, Prof. Zhiyi Wei from Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, CIOP2021 Technical Program Co-chair, announced the 2020 Editor-in-Chief Choice Awards of Photonics Research and Chinese Optics Letters. (Click to see detailed information.)

During the conference, Special events included:

  • Photonics Research Workshop: Deep Learning in Photonics,
  • Chinese Optics Letters Workshop: Lithium Niobate Based Photonic Devices,
  • Short Course: Technical Thesis Writing Essentials given by executive editor of Acta Optica Sinica, Prof. Jianlin Zhao from Northwestern Polytechnical University,
  • Meet CLP's Editors. 

During the poster session on the second day of the conference, total 271 posters presented their latest research developments. From all the excellent contributions, 20 poster presentations won the Best Poster Awards.

In addition, two and a half days of 16 panel discussions led to lively interactions between panelists and attendees on hot topics such as probing rotated Weyl physics on nonlinear lithium niobate-on-insulator chips, holographic secret sharing based on cascaded metasurface, large-scale silicon photonic circuits for quantum computation and quantum walk, and direct observation and control of resonances in silicon microdisks, etc. Throughout the whole conference, numerous authors, attendees, and exhibitors said that they were ecstatic to come to Xi'an and collect with their colleagues in person.

Under the double pressure of Zhengzhou floods and abrupt epidemics, we experienced higher than anticipated in-person and remote attendance. It was the joint effort of all attendees that made the conference held smoothly under the hard situation. We look forward to the reunion in Xi’an next August!” commented CLP General Manager Lei Yang.

 

About CIOP

CIOP, an annual conference with comprehensive topics on optics and photonics, was initiated in 2008 by the Chinese Laser Press, Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. The CIOP2021, closed recently in Xi'an, China, attracted 900 attendees from all over the world, including more than 300 invited speakers. CIOP2022 is scheduled to start on August 7-10, 2022 in Xi'an.