Nominators must complete a nominee submission by August 10th with the following:
The John Tyndall Award is presented annually to a single individual who has made outstanding contributions in any area of optical-fiber technology, including optical fibers themselves, the optical components used in fiber systems, as well as transmission systems and networks using fibers. The contributions which the award recognizes should have met the test of time and should have been of proven benefit to science, technology, or society.
Jointly sponsored by the IEEE Photonics Society and Optica, the award is endowed by Corning Inc.
Presented to: An Individual
Scope: to recognize outstanding contributions in any area of optical-fiber technology, including optical fibers themselves, the optical components used in fiber systems, as well as transmission systems and networks using fibers.
Prize: A specially commissioned Steuben crystal sculpture, a scroll, and an honorarium.
Basis for Judging: In the evaluation process, the following criteria are considered: the contributions which the award recognizes should have met the test of time and should have been of proven benefit to science, technology, or society. The contributions may be experimental or theoretical.
We are proud to recognize and celebrate honorees of the John Tyndall Award. First established in 1987 to honor the memory of John Tyndall who made distinguished contributions to physics, particularly his demonstration of total internal reflection in a continuous stream of water, our honorees as a group set the standard for pioneering or continuing contributions to fiber optics technology.
For seminal contributions to advances in optical fiber technology.
Dr. Ming-Jun Li received the B.S. degree in applied physics from Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China, in 1983, the M.S. degree in optics and signal processing from the University of Franche-Comte, Besancon, France, in 1985, and the Ph.D. degree in physics from University of Nice, Nice, France, in 1988.
Dr. Li joined Corning Incorporated in 1991 and is currently a Corporate Fellow. He has contributed to many optical fiber products including bend insensitive fiber for fiber-to-the-home, large effective area fiber, ultra-low polarization mode dispersion fiber and ultra-low loss fiber for high data rate transmission, low stimulated Brillouin scattering fiber for analog transmission, high bandwidth multimode fiber for data centers, multicore fibers and few mode fibers for space division multiplexing, various specialty fibers for connectors, fiber lasers, sensors and endoscopes, and glass waveguide devices for optical interconnect and sensing applications.
Dr. Li received the 1988 French National Prize on Guided-wave Optics, and Corning’s 2005 Stookey Award. He was a member of teams who won 1999 R&D 100 Award for LEAF® fiber, 2008 R&D 100 Award for ClearCurve® fiber, 2008 ACS Northeast Regional Industrial Innovation Award, Corning’s 2016 Outstanding External Publication Award, and 2017 ACS Heroes of Chemistry Award. He was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame for ClearCurve bend-insensitive optical fiber in 2022. He is a member of the US National Academy of Engineering, a Fellow of the IEEE, and a Fellow of the Optica. He holds 265 U.S. patents and has published 7 book chapters and over 330 papers in journals and for conferences. He has served as Associate Editor and Coordinating Committee Member, and Deputy Editor for the Journal of Lightwave Technology. He has also served as guest editor for several special journal issues and as general chair, program chair, subcommittee chair and member for many international conferences.
| Year | Award Winner | Citation |
|---|---|---|
| 2023 | Ming-Jun Li | For seminal contributions to advances in optical fiber technology. |
| 2022 | Meint Smit | For leadership in building a photonic integration ecosystem, and pioneering contributions to key photonic devices including the arrayed waveguide grating. |
| 2021 | Michal Lipson | In recognition of her fundamental and technological advances in integrated photonic devices. |
| 2020 | Roel Baets | For seminal research in silicon photonics and for driving the foundry model in this field. |
| 2019 | Kim Roberts | For pioneering contributions to the development of practical coherent communication systems. |
| 2018 | Peter J. Winzer | For contributions to understanding and advancing the capacity of coherent optical communication systems including advanced modulation formats and spatial multiplexing. |
| 2017 | E.M. Dianov | For pioneering leadership in optical fiber development and outstanding contributions to nonlinear fiber optics and optical fiber amplifiers. |
| 2016 | Alan H. Gnauck | For sustained pioneering research contributions that drove commercialization of high-speed, high capacity lightwave communication systems. |
| 2015 | Paul Daniel Dapkus | For pioneering and sustained contributions to the development of metal organic chemical vapor deposition and high performance quantum well semiconductor lasers.” |
| 2014 | Kazuro Kikuchi | For pioneering contributions to the fundamental understanding of coherent detection techniques. |
| 2013 | James J. Coleman | For contributions to semiconductor lasers and photonic materials, processing and device designs, including high reliability strained-layer lasers. |
| 2012 | John Bowers | For pioneering research in hybrid-silicon lasers and photonic integrated circuits. |
| 2011 | David F. Welch | For seminal contributions to photonic ICs and semiconductor lasers developed in fiber optic communication systems around the world. |
| 2010 | C. Randy Giles | For seminal contributions to advanced lightwave communications networks including erbium-doped fiber amplifiers, fiber Bragg grating-based subsystems, amd MEMS crossconnects. |
| 2009 | Joe C. Campbell | For seminal contributions to the understanding,design and telecommunication systems implementation of avalanche photodiodes |
| 2008 | Robert W. Tkach | For pioneering breakthroughs in high-capacity transmission systems and networks, including the invention of NZDF (non-zero dispersion fiber) and dispersion management of optical fiber nonlinearities. |
| 2007 | Emmanuel Desurvire | For pioneering contributions to the physical and theoretical understanding of Erbium-doped fiber amplifiers and to their early development. |
| 2006 | Donald Scifres | For seminal contributions to semiconductor laser diode technology that power the optical fiber networks and as an entrepreneur in creating one of the premier companies that bring to practice the semiconductor diode laser technology to serve the fiber optics industry. |
| 2005 | Roger H. Stolen | For fundamental contributions to the understanding of optical fiber nonlinearities, including the identification and understanding of simulated Raman scattering in fibers. |
| 2004 | Larry Coldren | For contributions to semiconductor laser diode technology, including widely tunable DBR lasers and vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers. |
| 2003 | Andrew Chraplyvy | For pioneering research on optical fiber nonlinearities and their dispersion management, and leading wavelength-division-multiplexed fiber transmission systems beyond Terabit/second capacities. |
| 2002 | Neal Bergano | For outstanding technical contributions to and technical leadership in the advancement of global undersea fiber optic communication systems. |
| 2001 | Tatsuo Izawa | For contributions to vapor-phase axial deposition for optical-fiber fabrication and pioneer work of silica-based lightwave circuits. |
| 2000 | Stewart Personick | For pioneering research in optical receiver design, system engineering, and optical time domain reflectometry, and for leadership in education and the promotion of fiber optics. |
| 1999 | John MacChesney | For the invention and development of the MCVD process which is one of the major techniques for the manufacture of low loss optical fibers and for high purity overcladding tubes using sol-gel techniques. |
| 1998 | Kenichi Iga | For pioneering contributions in the development of surface emitting lasers and planar microlens arrays for parallel optoelectronics. |
| 1997 | Ivan Kaminow | For contributions to lightwave device technology involving high-speed modulation, integrated optics, semiconductor lasers, polarization effects in fiber, and WDM components, and to optical FDM networks. |
| 1996 | Kenneth Hill | For discovery of photosensitivity in optical fibers and its application to Bragg gratings used in device applications in optical communications and sensor systems. |
| 1995 | Tingye Li | For sustained advances in high-capacity optical fiber communication systems created by his pioneering research, leadership, and personal contributions over more than two decades. |
| 1994 | Elias Snitzer | For pioneering contributions to optical propagation in fiber and to rare-earth-doped lasers and amplifiers. |
| 1993 | Yasuharu Suematsu | For contributions to wide-band optical fiber communication through his proposed dynamic single-mode lasers and semiconductor-based integrated optics. |
| 1992 | Dr. Donald B. Keck | For the invention and development of methods for manufacture and measurement of devices for optical communication, including low attenuation fibers |
| 1991 | David N. Payne | For outstanding contributions to the design, measurement and fabrication of optical fibers and active fiber devices. |
| 1990 | Thomas Giallorenzi | For significant technical, management, and professional contributions to the development and applications of fiber optics and optical fiber sensor technology. |
| 1989 | Stewart Miller | For his foresight, dedication, technical contributions and pioneering leadership in building the broad foundations for today’s fiber-optic telecommunications systems. |
| 1988 | Michael Barnoski | In recognition of his invention of devices and instruments fundamental to fiber optic technology, and the leadership that he has exerted both in professional societies and in industry in advancing optical communication technology. |
| 1987 | Robert Maurer | In recognition of his contributions to the discovery and understanding of materials and techniques for the fabrication of glass fiber waveguides for optical communication. |
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