The industry’s most innovative people 2024 Tobias Olaf Buchmann


Organisation: Technical University of Denmark Role: Postdoc


Tobias Olaf Buchmann is working in collaboration with Hamamatsu Photonics to advance the field of terahertz (THz) radiation. His project utilises photo-multiplier tube


(PMT) technology to reach beyond the limits imposed by the photo-electric effect and suitable low workfunction materials. Buchmann says this research facilitates the adaptation of vacuum-detector technology, along with its benefits, to encompass a significantly broader range of frequencies. “The potential impact of this technological


innovation is profound,” Buchmann says, “as it paves the way for rapid, highly sensitive,


Uwe Vogel


Organisation: Fraunhofer Institute for Organic Electronics, Electron Beam and Plasma Technology FEP


Role: Deputy Institute Director, Division Director Microdisplays & Sensors


Uwe Vogel leads a team of scientists, integrated circuit designers, technologists and technicians working on the next generation of microdisplay technologies. He is currently working on microdisplay backplane design and frontplane process integration technology, while ransparent microdisplays will be his biggest research priority in the coming year. He says the most surprising thing he


found in the course of his latest research was semitransparent (i.e., photonically active) microelectronics and microdisplays. Vogel believes supply chains and political


decisions are among the biggest challenges to the industry and that there is a need for support for more regional supply chains and work-arounds based on regional networks. Based in Germany, he thinks that


proximity to major European and world-wide semiconductor/microelectronics players is an opportunity for the sector. However, he says funding disparities are an issue: “Even though the phrase ‘photonics’ is actually comprising the term ‘microelectronics’, its importance in government funding is typically less strong than for pure microelectronics.”


Vassilia Zorba


Organisation: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory & UC Berkeley


Role: Laser Technologies Group Leader


Vassilia Zorba is the leader of the Laser Technologies Group at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She is also an Associate Adjunct Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering of UC Berkeley. Her research focuses on the development


of the next generation of laser tools for advanced sensors and laser-based manufacturing. Her research interests include ultrafast laser-material interactions, nonlinear optics, remote sensing, laser-induced plasma chemistry, and laser ablation-based chemical analysis in nuclear security and electrochemical energy storage, with


Based in: Berkeley, CA, US


Education: PhD, Applied Physics, University of Crete


emphasis on next-generation Li-ion batteries. Her work also focuses on femtosecond laser surface structuring technologies and biomimetic material functionalisation. Zorba’s credits include 92 publications


in peer-reviewed journals, more than 60 invited, keynote and plenary talks and a 2011 R&D 100 Technology Award. Additionally, she is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. Zorba serves as a senior editor for the Springer-Nature journal Applied Physics A. In 2024, she will be a co-chair of the LASE Symposium at SPIE Photonics West in San Francisco.


Based in: Dresden, Germany


Education: PhD, Biomedical Engineering, Technische Universität Dresden


Based in: Copenhagen, Denmark Education: PhD


and frequency-specific detection of radiation beyond the confines of the near-infrared region. This breakthrough holds immense promise for various applications, including spectroscopy and security.” Buchmann says the principle of cold field


electron emission – or quantum tunnelling – was the biggest surprise in his research. “It is amazing to operate far below the classical energies required to free an electron from the binding energy to its parent atom. In theory, it would require the combined energy of 1,000 photons at THz frequencies to supply sufficient energy to an electron to escape.”


50 Photonics100 2024


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