Associated photonics research
ACP principal scientists and ASP lecturers take on responsibilities at a number of non-university, associated research institutes in Jena.
Control room of the high-power laser system POLARIS.
DoKDoK 2016
To promote strategic partnerships, ASP sustains a multitude of theme-, project- and person-oriented collaboration forms in particular with non-university photonics institutes, as well as with the emerging Deutsches Optisches Museum, all of them located in Jena. These prime strategic partnerships are showing a strong societal impact, not only in the Jena region. This strategy has manifested in a dynamic and ever growing exchange of people, ideas, research results, finally leading to new intellectual property, optical system prototypes or start-ups – and has evolved as one of the key distinguishing features of Jena as an internationally unique photonics hub and ecosystem. Particularly, ASP provides fertile grounds when its graduates are continuing their professional careers at our premium partners.
Fraunhofer IOFInstitut
Jena‘s Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering (IOF) develops solutions for all aspects of light generation, light guidance and light measurement. Current focuses of its research activities include freeform technologies, micro- and nanotechnologies, fiber laser systems, quantum optics as well as optical technologies for safe human-machine interaction.
The institute focuses on the business fields of Sensors & Metrology, Opto-mechanical Systems, and Light Sources & Lasers. It is thereby able to offer the entire process chain or individual process steps for each of these areas – from the design to the production of components as well as the assembly to opto-mechanical or optoelectronic systems and holistic characterization.
Fraunhofer IOF can accompany customers from their initial request to the market launch. All research and development processes are carried out in line with market trends. The institute also takes care of translating results and developments into the processes of partners and customers in the form of personnel qualification or technology transfer. In addition to contract research, the institute also offers individual services according to its developed technologies. These services include, for example, the functional coating of surfaces, material and component testing, ultra-precision machining of components, high-speed 3D measurements or the construction of tailor-made special machines.
With its “Digital Innovation Hub Photonics” (DIHP), Fraunhofer IOF combines its technical expertise with competence in the field of innovation management and professional training at the highest level, making it one of the leading institutions in the national and international photonics industry.
Leibniz IPHT
How can we support physicians in diagnosing cancer faster, more gently and more accurately? How can we help them to treat patients with life-threatening infections and jointly combat the danger of growing resistance to antibiotics? Which drug residues pollute our water and what is in our food? Scientists at the Leibniz Institute of Photonic Technology (Leibniz IPHT) use light to find solutions to questions and urgent problems in the fields of health, environment, medicine and safety. They research photonic technologies for faster and more precise medical diagnostics, for safe medicines, for a new quality of food and water analysis and for innovative safety technology. They work on the vision to make our lives safer and healthier.
Under the motto “Photonics for Life”, one focus of research is on optical health technologies. To this end, three program areas are interlinked: Biophotonics, Fiber Optics and Photonic Detection. In 14 research departments and one junior research group, scientists use four key technologies: Fiber technology, planar micro- and nanotechnology, systems technology and statistical evaluation processes (chemometrics, machine learning and artificial intelligence).
Together with partners from research and industry, Leibniz IPHT pushes translation. According with the maxim “From Ideas to Instruments”, the institute covers the entire innovation chain – from basic technological research to the implementation of customized, application-ready solutions. The foundation for this is laid by an outstanding technological infrastructure. A technology center allows the production of highly precise and complex optical fibers. They are used as light sources, as fiber optic sensors and in probes and endoscopes. A clean room offers optimal conditions for research into highly sensitive detector and sensor concepts using micro- and nanotechnologies, for example, as well as for providing microfluidic components for lab-on-a-chip systems for medical and life science applications.
Helmholtzs Institute Jena
The Helmholtz Institute Jena (HI Jena) is an outstation of the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung, located on the campus of the Friedrich Schiller University Jena. Additional partners within the Helmholtz Association are the research centers Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY) in Hamburg and the Helmholtz Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR). The institute’s research is focused on the borderline between conventional accelerator technolgy and the rapidly developing field of laser-driven particle and photon sources. HI Jena provides important contributions to current and future large-scale research facilities, such as the FAIR project at the Helmholtzzentrum GSI, and the FEL photon sources FLASH and XFEL at DESY. Moreover, it effectively strengthens Jena’s research profile by facilitating new areas of research and significantly stimulating cooperation between the participating Helmholtz Centers and ACP principal scientists.
German Optical Museum
In a public-private-partnership the foundation “Deutsches Optisches Museum (D.O.M.)” is entirely redesigning all parts of the former museum of optics in Jena, transforming it into a research facility. On a publicly accessible area of about 2,500 m² in the city center of Jena, there will open a new and highly interactive permanent exhibition on optics & photonics in 2024. The narrative of D.O.M.’s exhibition is based on the holistic combination of three elements:
(1) live optical experiments, allowing the visitors to grasp the basic optical and photonic effects by personal interaction.
(2) presenting historic optical devices and instruments that were designed based on those effects, while putting the equipment in the context of its application.
And eventually (3) the showcase of optics research – providing a unified platform for young researchers from ACP, MPSP, and ASP to have a very visible public outreach of their latest publications.
All this is based on D.O.M.’s outstanding collection of historic optical equipment, the world’s largest archive of optical glasses, numerous antique and still working microscopes with thousands of historic objectives, many thousands of historical spectacle lenses since the middle ages, and the largest collection of grey literature on optical instruments. Research at D.O.M. is focused on the understanding of the application of optics. While revisiting historic experiments by combining antique optics with latest (imaging) technology, limitations of the past are revealed, providing impulses for new and innovative solutions to today’s tasks. In this context, D.O.M. always puts emphasis on the connection with the present. The work therefore considers both, the contribution to improving our standard of living and the gain in knowledge via the physical laws of optics.