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Allister Ferguson
FRSE, FIEEE, FOSA, Professor of Photonics

Allister Ferguson

Allister Ferguson was educated at Aberdeen Academy and the University of St.Andrews where he obtained a first class honours BSc and PhD in physics.

After completing is PhD in lasers and nonlinear optics, he was awarded a Lindemann Fellowship that enabled him to spend time as a visiting scholar at Stanford University where he worked with the Nobel Laureates Art Schawlow and Ted Haensch.

He has held academic posts at the University of Oxford where he was a Research Fellow at Merton College, University of Southampton and in 1998 took up the Chair of Photonics at the University of Strathclyde.

In addition to running a successful research group, he founded Microlase Optical Systems Ltd (now Coherent Scotland Ltd), the Institute of Photonics (where he is the Technical Director) and the Centre for Biophotonics (where he is Associate Director).

Since August 2004 he has been the Deputy Principal. He has responsibility for research strategy and policy and has overseen the university’s submission to RAE 2008. He has devised and implemented a new strategy, which has led to a very significant increase in research awards and success rates. He has responsibility for all aspects of knowledge exchange and in particular for all policy aspects of spin-out and licensing activity across the university.

He is a Fellow of the Institute of Physics, the Optical Society of America, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, the Institute for Contemporary Scotland and the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

| e: a.i.ferguson at strath.ac.uk | t: 0141 548 3359/4221 | u: http://www.photonics.phys.strath.ac.uk/ |

Research

summary

Highlights

Steering Committee member of International Conference on Laser Spectroscopy (ICOLS) 1983- ; co-chair  of ICOLS05, 2005; programme committee member for CLEO and CLEO Europe 2003-2007

Plenary talk at the Australasian Conference on Optics, Lasers and Spectroscopy 2005 and invited talk at “Physics 2005, a century after Einstein” (IOP, Warwick)

Editor-in-chief of the Journal of Physics D, 1998–2004

Chair of the selection committee for the IEEE Quantum Electronics Award 2003, 2004

Selected publications

W.Zhang, T.Ackemann, M.Schmid, N.Langford, A.I.Ferguson, "Femtosecond synchronously mode-locked vertical-external cavity surface-emitting laser", Opt. Exp. 14, 1810-1821 (2006) doi: 10.1364/OE.14.001810

W.Zhang, T.Ackemann, S.McGinily, M.Schmid, E.Riis, A.I.Ferguson, "Operation of an optical in-well-pumped vertical-external-cavity surface-emitting laser", Appl. Opt. 45, 7729-7735 (2006) doi: 10.1364/AO.45.007729

G.McConnell, A.I.Ferguson, "Simultaneous stimulated Raman scattering and second harmonic generation in periodically poled lithium niobate", Opt. Exp. 13, 2099-2104 (2005) doi: 10.1364/OPEX.13.002099

A.Major, J.S.Aitchison, P.W.E.Smith, N.Langford, A.I.Ferguson, "Efficient Raman shifting of high-energy picosecond pulses into the eye-safe 1.5-µm spectral region by use of a KGd(WO4)2 crystal", Opt. Lett. 30, 421-423 (2005) doi: 10.1364/OL.30.000421

R.H.Abram, K.S.Gardner, E.Riis, A.I.Ferguson, "Narrow linewidth operation of a tunable optically pumped semiconductor laser", Opt. Exp. 12, 5434-5439 (2004) doi: 10.1364/OPEX.12.005434

M.Schmid, S.Benchabane, F.Torabi-Goudarzi, R.Abram, A.I.Ferguson, E.Riis, "Optical in-well pumping of a vertical-external-cavity surface-emitting laser", Appl. Phys. Lett. 84, 4860-4862 (2004) doi: 10.1063/1.1760887

A.Major, J.S.Aitchison, P.W.E.Smith, N.Langford, A.I.Ferguson, "Coherent two-photon absorption spectroscopy of the Raman-active KGd(WO4)2 crystal", Opt. Lett. 29, 2896-2898 (2004) doi: 10.1364/OL.29.002896

G.McConnell, G.L.Smith, J.M.Girkin, A.M.Gurney, A.I.Ferguson, "Two-photon microscopy of fura-2-loaded cardiac myocytes with an all-solid-state tunable and visible femtosecond laser source", Opt. Lett. 28, 1742-1744 (2003) doi: 10.1364/OL.28.001742

J.E.Hastie, J.M.Hopkins, S.Calvez, C.W.Jeon, D.Burns, R.Abram, E.Riis, A.I.Ferguson, M.D.Dawson, "0.5-W single transverse-mode operation of an 850-nm diode-pumped surface-emitting semiconductor laser", IEEE Photon. Technol. Lett. 15, 894-896 (2003) doi: 10.1109/LPT.2003.813446

A.Major, I.Nikolakakos, J.S.Aitchison, A.I.Ferguson, N.Langford, P.W.E.Smith, "Characterization of the nonlinear refractive index of the laser crystal Yb:KGd(WO4)2", Appl. Phys. B-Lasers Opt. 77, 433-436 (2003) doi: 10.1007/s00340-003-1252-1

A.Major, N.Langford, S.T.Lee, A.I.Ferguson, "Additive-pulse mode locking of a thin-disk Yb:YAG laser", Appl. Phys. B-Lasers Opt. 76, 505-508 (2003) doi: 10.1007/s00340-002-1004-7

A.Major, N.Langford, T.Graf, D.Burns, A.I.Ferguson, "Diode-pumped passively mode-locked Nd:KGd(WO4)2 laser with 1-W average output power", Opt. Lett. 27, 1478-1480 (2002) doi: 10.1364/OL.27.001478

Current Grants

Allister Ferguson, Thorsten Ackemann
EPSRC (2009-2012) £211437
Title: Standford-Scotland Photonics Innovation Collaboration

Allister Ferguson, Martin Dawson, John Girkin, David Burns
EPSRC (2006-2011) £849208
Title: Advanced solid-state laser sources and systems

Allister Ferguson
EPSRC (2004-2010) £125000
Title: Academic Fellowship - Kevin Ronald