Some more pictures of OptoInformatics2012 workshop:

Day 3 of OptoInformatics 2012

The morning of the last day focused on the use of low-NA objectives for 3-D optical trapping using counter-propagating beams and spatial light modulators to modify the phase of light. It was an excellent overview showing state-of-the-art experiments including a multi-sphere-mounted needle that could be used (even by politicians visiting the lab) to inject or probe cells at a sub-micron scale. This was followed by an interesting study of random waves and phase singularities. The half-day session ended with Prof. Dainty recalling his time as a research student with Prof. Welford, work on speckle and the early days of computation for data analysis. Looking into the crystal ball we had a general discussion on possible future routes for optics in the coming decades on themes as biomedical optics, sensors, imaging, and green technologies. With this we came to the end of the road for OptoInformatics 2012, but not for optics. Indeed, in the words of Prof. Glückstad, optics has never been more alive than now as showcased very nicely by Prof. Dainty on a slide of the voluminous Opto-Mechanical catalogue from Thorlabs that started little more than 20 years ago. The winners of the OptoInformatics 2012 awards were announced:

1st prize of the contributed talks went to Dr. Huanqing Guo for his presentation on "Psychophysical visual blur and acuity studies with adaptive optics"

1st prize of the poster awards went to Fiona Kenny for the work "Far-field vectorial polarimeter using programmable three-dimensional focal fields"

Two runner-up poster awards went to Penelope Lawton for the work "Using optical tweezers and a novel high speed camera to investigate conditions inside a dishwasher" and jointly to Rebecca McQuaid and JiaJun Li for the work "Comparison of accelerated corneal cross-linking to standard cross-linking using second-harmonic optical microscopy"

Thank you to all of the speakers, presenters and participants for making OptoInformatics 2012 come true.

Day 2 of OptoInformatics 2012

A second day of OptoInformatics 2012 has come to a close after a nice dinner in the lovely Pugin Hall. The day started wet but we did get a glimpse of the Sun in the late afternoon. We enjoyed a day that started out with interesting talks on the eye, chromatic aberrations and excellent work on retinal imaging with adaptive optics, photoreceptor waveguiding and psychophysical impact of defocus and blurred vision. The afternoon linked back to OptoInformatics 2010 when Prof. Dainty talked about focusing of light through highly scattering media. Today Prof. Mertz discussed the optimal solutions and requirements to the number of active elements on a spatial light modulator and followed this up with wonderful movies taken into an egg showing blood flow and amplitude and phase contrast imaging with a fiber-based endoscope. The last talk of the day revisited holography and showed nice examples of 3-D images created simultaneously with several spatial light modulators. The football news that ended the day was a victory to England over a well-playing but slightly less effective Sweden. Don't miss out tomorrow where we will be hearing about optical tweezers and also get some thoughts about where optics might be moving in the coming years as Prof. Dainty looks into the crystal ball.

Some pictures taken during day 1 at the OptoInformatics 2012 workshop.

Day 1 of OptoInformatics 2012

First day of an exciting workshop with presentations covering a range of topics from vectorial diffraction and confocal microscopy to wavefront sensing and imaging with adaptive optics. This was followed by the excellent posters displaying a wide range of great optics work in Ireland and abroad. Tomorrow our focus will be on the eye and imaging in scattering samples. The evening ended with Ireland loosing to Spain but well - at least we kept our faith not steering away from a major challenge.

Full programme

The full programme (pdf-file) is available here:
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0ByHKMg1jK-0HY0kyMWh0OFRBb3M

It includes the location and directions to Maynooth (from Dublin Airport), the programme and the presentation and poster abstracts.

4 weeks to OptoInformatics

The scientific programme will be published within short. In the meantime, predictions are for good (dry) weather during OptoInformatics, fingers crossed!
http://www.dryday.com/ireland/dublin/dublin-30-day-weather-forecast/