Following the Photons: A Photonics Podcast

A tech pioneer's path to the future

This is the first of a multi-part series featuring Robin Hawk, a pioneer in the optics and photonics industry who has co-developed several technologies, including HDTV.
She is now CEO of Galxyz LLC, a company she founded with her husband, Dan Hawk, where they’re developing next-generation technologies like nuclear diamond-powered ultraviolet quantum photonics platforms, end-to-end optical network systems, and nuclear-electric power systems.
In this episode, she talks about her extensive background in the industry, and her experiences working alongside some of the world’s most renowned researchers and scientists.
 

Interview Selects

With time constraints and other considerations, not everything from our Following the Photons podcast interviews makes the cut. So, in this episode, we’re sharing some never-before-heard excerpts from a few of those fascinating interviews.
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Photonic Chips: The Next Generation

In this episode, host Justine Murphy is talking with Hamed Sattari, CEO of CCRAFT, a spinoff of ELENA, a three-and-half-year research project funded by the European Commission under the Horizon 2020 program, that ultimately produced a platform for photonic integrated circuits based on lithium-niobate-on-insulator.
Hamed has more than 15 years of experience in the field, and aims to continue moving the next generation of photonics technology into the future.
 

Light News 07.15.25

Here's another roundup of some of the most exciting news happening in the photonics industry!
 

The publication of optics

This week’s episode features Dr. Matthew E. L. Jungwirth, manager of Technical Content and Scientific Publishing and Press Manager  at SPIE. He has degrees in physics, electrical engineering, and optical sciences, and holds 25 patents, has authored numerous publications, and has released products in areas ranging from barcode sensing to quantum information processing.
 

Work/life balance in silicon photonics

In this episode, host Justine Murphy talks with Eléonore Hardy, the Silicon Photonics Partnership Manager at CEA-Leti. She has worked in the optics/photonics industry since 2005, and is now dedicated to developing new business opportunities in silicon photonics for applications like high-performance computing.

Service and support via photonics and AI

Jeff Hutchins, director of optical technologies in the CTO office at Ranovus—an Ontario, Canada-based company focused on next-generation optical interconnect solutions via silicon photonics—is dedicated to advancing and educating the photonics and optics industry. He’s heavily involved in the Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF), for which he serves as vice chair of its Energy Efficient Interfaces initiative.

A unique quantum view of optoacoustics

The intriguing Dr. Birgit Stiller is the focus of this episode. She’s a professor at Leibniz University Hannover, and an experimental physicist and researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light in Germany, where she leads the Quantum Optoacoustics independent research group. With numerous accolades under her belt, Dr. Stiller has spent years focused on integrated photonic circuits, Brillouin scattering in photonic crystal fibers, and now quantum communications, specifically quantum key distribution and quantum hacking.

Industry spotlight shines on quantum

In this episode, host Justine Murphy talks with Dr. Ramy Shelbaya, co-founder and CEO of Quantum Dice. A physicist with a Ph.D. in atomic and laser physics from the University of Oxford, he's spent years working on quantum technologies for a variety of applications.

Why not change the world?

This episode features Jason Eichenholz, an entrepreneur who has founded several tech startups, and a recognized pioneer in laser- and photonics-enabled innovation. He's also founder of Jonathan's Landing Foundation, a non-profit that creates a comprehensive community for adults with autism.