The awards presented by Optica celebrate those in the field who are making significant technical, research, education, business, leadership and service accomplishments.

Robert Boyd, University of Ottawa, Canada, and University of Rochester, USA, is recognized for pioneering contributions to nonlinear optics, including slow light, quantum imaging, and the development of nanocomposite optical materials and metamaterials with the 2023 Frederic Ives Medal / Jarus W Quinn Prize.

“Bob Boyd is an internationally renowned leader in nonlinear optics whose work has led to critical advances across multiple areas of optics,” said Michal Lipson, Optica’s 2023 President. “Congratulations on this well-deserved honor.”

First presented in 1929, the Frederic Ives Medal recognizes overall distinction in optics and is Optica’s highest award. The Quinn Prize was added in 1995 in honor of Optica’s first executive director, Jarus W Quinn.

The other 2023 recipients are

Esther Hoffman Beller Medal: Harold Metcalf, Stony Brook University, USA. for outstanding mentorship of undergraduate students in hands-on optics research and for organizing an annual symposium for students to present their work during the FiO/LS conference,

Max Born Award: Marin Soljacic, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA, for seminal contributions to the fields of plasmonics, electromagnetism, and topological photonics,

Stephen D Fantone Distinguished Service Award: Alexander L Gaeta, Columbia University, USA, for his role as founding editor-in chief of Optica and his commitment to excellence in the optics and photonics community,

Michael S Feld Biophotonics Award: Brian T Cunningham, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA, for innovative and transformative research in optical sensing, spectroscopy, and microscopy as well as leadership and entrepreneurship in technology development of photonic crystal biosensors,

Joseph Fraunhofer Award / Robert M Burley Prize: Xiaoyi Bao, University of Ottawa, Canada, for seminal contributions to optical fiber-based systems ranging from telecom testing protocols and instruments, to pioneering work on distributed sensor instrumentation for infrastructure monitoring, to multi-parameter sensing probes for medical imaging,

Nick Holonyak Jr Award: Yeshaiahu Fainman, University of California San Diego, USA, for pioneering contributions to nanoscale science and engineering of ultra-small, sub-micrometer semiconductor light emitters and nanolasers for information processing systems applications,

Robert E Hopkins Leadership Award: Vanderlei Salvador Bagnato, University of São Paulo -  Instituto de Fisica de Sao Carlos, Brazil, for outstanding contributions to the global impact of optics and photonics and for promoting the field to the general public world-wide,

Emmett N Leith Medal: David Jones Brady, University of Arizona, USA, for the invention of sparse holography,

Ellis R Lippincott Award: Peter R Griffiths, University of Idaho, USA, for unique achievements and significant contributions to vibrational spectroscopy,

Adolph Lomb Medal: William Renninger, University of Rochester, USA, for pioneering contributions to opto-mechanics, ultrashort pulse generation, novel fiber lasers, and multimode nonlinear optics,

C E K Mees Medal: Scott Diddams, University of Colorado at Boulder, USA, for pioneering innovations leading to the wide-ranging application of optical frequency combs to ultrafast lasers, optical clocks, spectroscopy, microwave synthesis, and astronomy,

William F Meggers Award: Stephan Schlemmer, Universität zu Köln, Germany, for pioneering ultrasensitive action spectroscopy with fundamental applications to spectra of molecular ions, particularly CH₅⁺, and their key roles in astrochemistry,

David Richardson Medal: Turan Erdogan, Plymouth Grating Laboratory Inc, USA, for numerous contributions to the commercial development of optical components and technologies through remarkable entrepreneurship and business acumen leading to products and applications in numerous areas including optical fiber systems, medical optics, and femtosecond laser technology,

Kevin P Thompson Optical Design Innovator Award: Eric M Schiesser, Synopsys Inc, Optical Solutions Group, USA, for innovation and rigor in optical design methodology,                         

Edgar D Tillyer Award: Andrew Watson, Apple Inc, USA, for pioneering the application of computational approaches to understand foundational aspects of spatial and temporal vision as well as motion perception and their influential application in the field of image quality,                        

Charles Hard Townes Medal: Andrew Weiner, Purdue University, USA, for ground-breaking work bringing optical frequency combs to the quantum world and developing innovative applications spanning several fields, including coherent control, generation and line-by-line manipulation of frequency combs, and ultrabroadband radio-frequency photonics,                     

R W Wood Prize: Alexandra Boltasseva, Purdue University, USA, for groundbreaking contributions to the materials aspects of metamaterials, plasmonics, and nanophotonics.