Prof. Huanqing Ye (葉煥青), Dame Kathleen Ollerenshaw Fellow and Assistant Professor at the Photon Science Institute and the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at the University of Manchester, visited IAPME on 16-17 April, 2025. During his visit, he delivered an insightful presentation titled “Molecular rare-earth material systems for the applications of next-generation photonic integrated technologies” . The seminar was hosted by Prof. Handong Sun.
Prof. Ye’s current research interest focuses on the optical characterisation of nanophotonic materials and the development of active photonic integrated devices. He was the senior scientist at Chromosol Ltd, a spin-out company from Queen Mary University of London, from 2018 to 2022, leading the R&D of organic-integrated silicon lasers for photonics 2.0. He worked as a postdoctoral research fellow at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore from 2015 to 2018 and obtained a PhD in Physics at Queen Mary University of London in 2014. He has participated in projects totalling £5M funding from Innovate UK and UK Research Innovation as co-investigators.
During the talk, Prof. Ye first introduced molecular rare-earth materials which uniquely combine the optical properties of rare-earth ions with the processibility of organic materials. This combination enables the development of cable and cost-effective integrated light source technologies. He then presented their research on the correlation between organic vibrational modes, optical transitions and electronic states of rare-earth ions that emit technologically important telecom-compatible near-infrared wavelengths. He also discussed the advantages of organic sensitisation in enhancing the power efficiency of rare-earth-based gain materials, previous R&D of developing integrated on-chip devices, and potential applications of these materials in quantum optics.
During the visit to IAPME, Prof. Ye has exchanged ideas with members of Prof. Handong Sun’s group.
