Welcome to my homepage, I am research director at CNRS, based at FEMTO-ST institute (Université de Franche-Comté, UFC) in Besançon, France. I am currently working with the nonlinear photonics group, which I led during 10 years, from 2010 to 2020. My research focuses on laser physics and nonlinear optics with fundamental and practical impacts. More specifically, I investigate fundamental nonlinear optical effects that occur in specialty optical fibers and other tiny waveguides (nanofibers, chips, microresonators, etc) with the aim of developing potential applications to all-optical signal processing, optical communications, fiber lasers, broadband supercontinuum generation, and optical fiber sensors. Our group has broad expertise in fiber optics and nonlinear optics and has done many scientific achievements in the fields of broadband fiber-based parametric amplification, supercontinuum light generation, Raman fiber lasers, passively mode-locked fiber lasers, and Brillouin light scattering in specialty optical fibers. You can access and read my peer-review articles from my Google Scholar or my ORCID.
My current research involves the nonlinear interactions between light and condensed matter and their applications - particularly through the use of various glass-based optical fibers and related tiny waveguides such as photonic crystal fibers, optical nanofibers, and micro-resonators. I am pecifically working on the following research topics:
• Design of specialty optical fibers for nonlinear optics applications,
• Development of supercontinuum fiber sources from the ultraviolet to the mid-infrared wavelength range,
• Investigation of optomechanical interactions and Brillouin scattering in optical nanofibers and microstructured fibers,
• Design and development of ultrafast fiber lasers using novel nonlinear mode-locking techniques,
• Measurement of real-time ultrafast nonlinear dynamics in nonlinear fiber optics and fiber lasers,
• Development of fiber-based optical parametric amplifiers and Raman fiber lasers for optical telecommunications,
Most of this work is conducted in collaboration with industrial and academic partners in France and abroad (for details, See my collaborators' list). My research projects are funded by many grants from several national and European agencies (for details, See my grants' list).
I also teach advanced nonlinear photonics to Master’s and Ph.D. students at the University of Franche-Comté, within the Graduate School of Engineering, Physics, and Sciences for Innovation and Research (EIPHI). I have supervised over 17 Ph.D. students, all of whom have successfully graduated and secured excellent positions in academia or the photonics industry.
I am a Senior member of The Optical Society of America (now OPTICA), member of the international society for Optics and Photonics (SPIE), of the IEEE Photonics Society, of the French Society of Optics (SFO), and of the European Optical Society (EOS). In 2012, I received the Fabry-de-Gramont Award from the SFO for my scientific achievements in the field of nonlinear photonics. In 2024, I was elected Fellow Member of the OPTICA society.
As a scientist who plies my trade to photonics research and innovation, I never cease to be inspired by the exceptional creativity of great physicists of the past whose ideas were unremittingly brilliant. I have been fascinated by laser and optical science since an early age and I haven't looked back since !
I am also passionate about scientific photography. See below one of my first pictures in laser science taken in 2003 using a Sony cyber-shot digital camera (1.5" LCD, 4.0 megapixels, 3x optical zoom).
This picture illustrates supercontinuum white light generation in a photonic crystal fiber pumped by a Ti:Sa femtosecond laser (2003, © T. Sylvestre)