Activity Report OUTLINE. Distribution of NEMO Edukits Science show Fun activities Access to the SPIE Digital Library Conferences

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1 Activity Report Period: May 2008 April 2009 Advisor: Officers: Prof. Hugo Thienpont Sara Van Overmeire (President) Els Moens (Vice-President) Thomas Geernaert (Treasurer) Lawrence Bogaert (Secretary) Nathalie Vermeulen (Past President) OUTLINE I. ACTIVITY REPORT Distribution of NEMO Edukits Science show Fun activities Access to the SPIE Digital Library Conferences II. OVERVIEW OF PLANNED ACTIVITIES Science show/edukit movies Job event Photonics Europe 2010 III. IV. FINANCIAL STATEMENT MEMBER LISTING 1

2 I. ACTIVITY REPORT DISTRIBUTION OF NEMO EDUKITS 1. DISTRIBUTION OF EDUKITS The Edukit is a free educational optics kit developed by the European Network of Excellence on Micro Optics (NEMO) for giving school children the opportunity to get acquainted with optics and photonics already from secondary school level onwards. Over the past several years NEMO has been distributing (and is still distributing) Edukits all over Europe. In addition, since the NEMO network is coordinated by Brussels University, we (the SPIE Brussels Student Chapter) have been providing several training sessions on the Edukit to students and teachers of Belgian schools over the past few years. To bring the dissemination of NEMO s Edukit to a truly international level, our chapter came up last year with a plan to provide Edukits to other SPIE student chapters worldwide, whereby both the cost of the Edukits and the delivery expenses would be covered by the NEMO network. First, at the student chapter workshop at SPIE Optics&Photonics in August 2008, our chapter's president Sara gave a short demonstration of the Edukit and informed the attendees about the free distribution of Edukits to student chapters that are interested in using these kits at their outreach events (Figure 1). After sending out the Edukit application form to the attendees of the student chapter workshop, we received in September 2008 applications from 21 chapters worldwide, which we provided with more than 700 Edukits in total. As agreed with Dirk Fabian from SPIE, these chapters also received educational material from SPIE such as CD ROMs and posters that they could use as additional illustrative material during their Edukit demonstrations. The location of the participating chapters on the world map is shown in Figure 2, which clearly demonstrates that we have been able to reach chapters from truly all over the world. Figure 1: Demonstration of the Edukit at SPIE Optics&Photonics 2

3 Figure 2: Location of SPIE student chapters that applied for Edukits. The number of Edukits that we have sent to them is also indicated 3

4 When sending out the free Edukits, we asked the chapters that they would in return send us afterwards a filled out Edukit evaluation form. We received in total 17 evaluation forms from which we could extract the following information: in total more than 1000 pupils and 100 teachers have been reached through the chapters Edukit activities. The optical components in the Edukits were found to be very useful, and we received several recommendations on how to further improve the manual. Furthermore, most teachers were very enthusiastic about the Edukit demonstrations organised by the chapters, and many different experiments have been carried out. Finally, we received many wonderful pictures from the chapters activities with the Edukit, some of which are shown in Figure 3. In conclusion, the worldwide distribution of the Edukits with the support of NEMO and of SPIE has become a real success, and with the feedback that we received, our chapter and also other people at our university will further work on the optimization and the further development of educational optics kits. Figure 3: Pictures taken during Edukit demonstrations by different SPIE student chapters 2. EDUKIT VIDEO TUTORIAL CONTEST One of the recommendations that our chapter received to further improve the user friendliness of the Edukit was to extend the manual on the accompanying Edukit CD ROM with a video tutorial on the Edukit. Therefore, in October 2008 we launched amongst the chapters that received Edukits a creativity contest (with in total 2000 USD prize money provided by SPIE), challenging the chapters to compose an Edukit video tutorial in which experiments with the Edukit were demonstrated. The video tutorials should be conceptualized such that they would allow teachers to learn faster what they can do with the Edukits in their class rooms with pupils of a specific age category. Our chapter received 3 original and entertaining submissions from 3 different chapters, and currently SPIE is still judging the submissions to decide how the prize money of 2000 USD will be divided. 4

5 SCIENCE SHOW 1. GENERAL CONCEPT The Flemish Science Week (17 th 26 th October 2008) yearly attracts over 30,000 visitors and aims at familiarizing people with all kinds of science and technology. Musea, scientific organizations, and universities offer a wide variety of activities for the broad public. One of these activities was a Science Show on Photonics, organized by our SPIE student chapter on the university s campus in Brussels. The show was announced as an introduction in the magnificent world of light and light technology. Pupils from secondary schools could register on line for one of the shows in advance. Most of them were registered as a group by one of their science teachers. All members of the SPIE student chapter board and several of their colleagues of the Department of Applied Physics and Photonics at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel presented a part of the show s subjects such as polarization, infrared radiation and thermal cameras, light sources and green photonics, biophotonics, reflection and refraction and optical fibers (sensing). With interactive experiments, video and photo projections and a mini laser show, the role of photonics in our daily life was made clear. Specialized sound and lighting, an advanced camera system and an enthusiastic atmosphere were the ingredients for this up tempo trip through optics and photonics. Figure 4: Science Show setting and our President Jürgen Van Erps 5

6 2. OVERVIEW OF THE CONTENTS OF THE SHOW Five aspects of photonics where discussed during the Photonics Science Show. These are: generating light, properties of light, light and animals, manipulating light and transporting light. The show started with an overview of the different ways that light can be generated. This covered natural light sources such as the sun or certain chemical reactions and man made light sources. We demonstrated the idea of an energy efficient light source. For this, we connected a light bulb and a light emitting diode (LED) to a hand powered energy source. In this way students could clearly see the difference in light output between a bright LED and a faint light bulb. We also compared the benefits and disadvantages of the light bulb, LED and fluorescent tube lighting. We ended this first section with some short movies about new flexible organic LED products and about the laser as a monochromatic and coherent light source. Next, we discussed the properties of light. We started with making clear what the velocity of a wave is. For this, we compared the light flash and the load roar that occur with lightning. We overviewed the electromagnetic spectrum and demonstrated non visible waves using an infrared camera that was aimed at the audience. This made the students aware that they are all emitting infrared waves even if they cannot be seen by their eyes. We also explained the polarization of light and how this is used to generate full color images in liquid crystal displays. The science show also included a section about how nature is mimicked in sight of creating better photonic products. Insect facet eyes were discussed and their applications in medicine where shown. We also discussed how light is manipulated. We explained the basics of light refraction at the interface between two materials. This was then used to explain how convex and concave lenses work. We also overviewed single lens systems such as the human eye and more complex lens systems such as zoom lenses or microscope objectives. We then made the step from macro optics to micro optics and diffractive optics. We ended this section by demonstrating the focusing action of a large plastic Fresnel lens. Finally, we discussed how light can be transported. We started with explaining the principle of total internal reflection. With this knowledge we then continued with the concept of transporting light through fibers and using this as an optical data connection. Besides fiber optic data connections, we discussed the use of fibers in sensing applications with incorporated Bragg gratings. This was demonstrated with a prototype system consisting of an elephant trunk that could be grabbed. By doing so the wavelength of the reflected light changed. We ended the show with distributing more detailed information on the different aspects that where covered to the teachers accompanying the students. 6

7 (a) (b) (c) Figure 5: (a) Presenters of the Science Show, (b) demonstration of a Fresnel lens and (c) movie of a bronchoscopy and a view on the audience 3. VISIBILITY This one hour Photonics Science Show was presented three times and in total, more than 600 pupils between 16 and 18 attended it. They were accompanied by in total 30 teachers, who all received a package containing a NEMO Edukit, a SPIE laser pointer and gadgets, educational material from SPIE such as CD ROMs and posters that they could use as additional illustrative material in the classroom, and more information on photonics and studying photonics in general. We received the contact information of all teachers through the organizers of the Science Week, giving us the opportunity to keep in touch with the schools and to inform them on new outreach events organised by our chapter. Several teachers gave positive feedback on the show, they appreciated that we discussed different topics and that for each topic we repeated some basic theory before going into detail. As such their pupils got a brief revision of the theory they already discussed in the classroom, but also learned about new exciting applications of this theory. 7

8 FUN ACTIVITIES 1. TONA BBQ On Thursday April 26 th, 2008, our university organized its yearly barbecue for all the university staff members. The university puts tables, chairs and barbecues to its members disposal and treats them to an appetizer and a dessert. So the staff members only need to bring their meat, vegetables and drinks. Several members of the Department of Applied Physics and Photonics TONA, among which several members of our SPIE student chapter board joined and enjoyed a nice and sunny afternoon. Figure 6: TONA and student chapter members enjoying the barbecue 2. STUDENT CHAPTER LUNCH To introduce ourselves to the students doing a Master in Photonics at our university, we organized on December 18 th a welcome lunch at our department. All students and all student chapter members were invited to this informal lunch, where they had the opportunity to get to know each other and to meet our board members and our advisor Prof. Hugo Thienpont. With this event we closed the first semester of the academic year and we started Christmas holidays in a very pleasant way! 8

9 3. NEW YEAR S LUNCH The SPIE Brussels Student Chapter this year didn t organize the traditional Christmas dinner, but chose for a New Year s lunch. All members of the student chapter and of the Applied Physics and Photonics department of our university were invited to a walking lunch with cold and hot snacks. Prior to this event, all participants had to submit an original slide to the organizers to introduce themselves and their work to the rest of the group. The slide show was shown continuously during our lunch. Thanks to the walking in walking lunch, the members of the student chapter had the freedom to walk from table to table and the opportunity to share thoughts with many different friends. Figure 7: TONA and student chapter members at the New Year s lunch 9

10 ACCESS TO THE SPIE DIGITAL LIBRARY The SPIE Brussels Student Chapter continues to devote part of its budget to provide access to the SPIE Digital Library for the chapter members. The members of the student chapter have access to the SPIE Digital Library through the personal subscription of one student chapter officer. For a request, the students should send an to the officer with the complete reference of the paper. A list of the already downloaded papers is kept to avoid duplicate downloads. We will evaluate this approach later on. II. OVERVIEW OF PLANNED ACTIVITIES SCIENCE SHOW/EDUKIT MOVIES Since we liked the idea of the Edukit videos, we are planning to expand this idea towards the experiments performed at the Science Show. For each experiment we would like to make a small high quality movie of a few minutes, which could be distributed e.g. on YouTube, so that students or children can watch them independently and get a flavour of what optics and photonics can do. JOB EVENT At the end of March 2008, our student chapter and the department of Applied Physics and Photonics (TONA) of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel organized for the first time a mini job event for the students who are doing a Master in Photonics, Master in Electronics or who are in the Erasmus Mundus in Photonics program at our university. As we received a lot of positive reactions from both the students and the companies afterwards, it was decided to make this job happening a yearly event, alternately organised by the University of Ghent and our university in Brussels. This year, on March 30 th, 2009, the event took place in Ghent, where it was organised by the IEEE/LEOS Benelux Student Chapter. Our president Sara and treasurer Lawrence, accompanied by a lot of our student chapter members, attended this Photonics Event where they had the opportunity to network with other students and representatives of more than 10 companies all active in optics and photonics. Next year, in spring 2010, our SPIE Brussels Student Chapter will organise a similar job event in Brussels. 10

11 PHOTONICS EUROPE 2010 One of the other activities that we will organize next year is a workshop for PhD students (but of course everybody is welcome!) at the SPIE Photonics Europe Conference, to be held in Brussels from April 12th to April 16th The main topic will be The do s and don ts in Photonics. The main idea is to have different speakers, all talking for about 30 to 40 minutes about their experiences in photonics. We already have some ideas for topics that could be interesting: 1) Do s and Don ts in Photonics Research 2) Do s and Don ts in Working Together with the Press 3) Do s and Don ts in EU Project Writing 4) Do s and Don ts in Intellectual Property and Patents 5) Do s and Don ts in Building a Lab By organizing this event, we want to bring PhD students (and others) together with experts to interchange experiences. In 2008 the workshop on Entrepreneurship was a great success, especially the diner afterwards, where we talked with the experts in an informal way and learned a lot about entrepreneurship. Of course we want this activity to be a great success, as it was at SPIE Photonics Europe 2008! III. FINANCIAL STATEMENT The SPIE Brussels Student Chapter was established in April 2006, and the table below shows its actual financial situation. Previous balance (May 2008) $ May 12 SPIE 2008 Student Chapter funds May 16 T shirt printing costs October 27 SPIE Digital Library subscription December 17 Drinks welcome lunch Account cost 3.63 Current balance (May 2009) $ (currency of May 1 st, 2009) We will soon apply for the SPIE student chapter funding It should also be mentioned that our chapter advisor, Prof. Hugo Thienpont, has matched the expenses for a large part of our activities and provided full financial support for some others. The material used for the Science Show was partially funded by the organisers of the Science Week, through financial support of the Flemish Government. Our president, Sara Van Overmeire, received an SPIE Officer Travel Grant to represent our chapter at the Leadership Workshop at SPIE Optics & Photonics 2008 in San Diego, CA. 11

12 IV. MEMBER LISTING Our current list of members looks as follows: 1. Hamed Ahmadpanahi 2. Lennert Appeltant 3. Inigo Artundo 4. Lawrence Bogaert (Secretary) 5. Arno Bouwens 6. Pieter Jan Cauwenbergh 7. Werner Coomans 8. Gordon Craggs 9. Frederic de Robiano 10. Tom Dorissen 11. Anjori Dutta 12. Thomas Geernaert (Treasurer) 13. Tom Guldemont 14. Arno Keppens 15. Rakesh Maharjan 16. Els Moens (Vice President) 17. Vijayekumar Rajaraman 18. Stijn Roelandt 19. Johan Speybrouck 20. Sanne Sulejmani 21. Nimendra Tuladhar 22. Sara Van Overmeire (President) 23. Jana Vanderheijden 24. Pierre Wahl 12