A public lecture by Professor Jim Coleman, University of Illinois, Urbana - All welcome

The year 2010 marks the golden anniversary of the first demonstration of the laser. In this talk, we introduce a bit of the history of the laser – including gas, solid state, and semiconductor lasers – and some of the people who created them. We will outline connections between the science and engineering of lasers, several Nobel prizes, and the information age we live in today.

James J. Coleman is the Intel Alumni Endowed Chair in Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Illinois, Urbana. He has worked on semiconductor lasers for thirty-five years and has received several awards for his work including the IEEE David Sarnoff Award, the OSA Nick Holonyak, Jr. Award, the Heinrich Welker Award, and the IEEE William Streifer Scientific Achievement Award. He is a Fellow of the IEEE, the Optical Society of America, the American Physical Society, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science