With global revenues exceeding $300 billion annually, the core optics and photonics industry — enabling everything from medical imaging, communication, and food safety to self-driving cars, exoplanet exploration, and virtual-reality technology — is worth celebrating. Showcasing this industry’s success and future promise, a series of career vignettes of optics and photonics engineers and scientists will drive the International Day of Light (IDL) “Possible Through Light” campaign this year.

Jessie Christiansen, a NASA scientist working on detecting and characterizing exoplanets; Matthew Weed, a Luminar engineer and product strategist working on lidar sensors for automotive safety; and Paula Kirya, an undergraduate student in bioengineering, are the featured profiles of the “Possible Through Light” campaign, rolled out on 4, 10, and 16 of May, respectively.

Three optics and photonics-focused professional societies — SPIE, IEEE Photonics Society, and Optica — partnered to create the videos and campaign to highlight this year's International Day of Light, a celebration held annually on 16 May.

“The International Day of Light is a really cool initiative that serves a whole bunch of purposes,” Weed notes as part of his interview. “It’s a big international moment to bring focus to this field that people take for granted … a really exciting opportunity to celebrate what we as a community in optics have given to the world and to bring attention to this, to inspire the next generation to take up the torch.”

On 16 May, the website will include the original interviews with Christiansen, Weed, and Kirya; information about possible careers in the field of optics and photonics, from optical engineers and laser technicians, to academic researchers; and a selection of resources for optics and photonics-focused education and careers.

With its engaging, real-life profiles and interviews, “Possible Through Light” extends an invitation to future generations of scientists, technicians, engineers, and industry leaders to consider the remarkable technological advancements that can be achieved with a career in optics and photonics.   

“Possible Through Light” builds on the 2022 IDL campaign, “Our future is light. Play your part,” by showcasing exciting innovations and compelling careers in optics and photonics and the importance of light-based technologies, while raising awareness of the annual IDL celebration on 16 May.