The annual focal points of anniversaries, give us a great platform to get together and commemorate things that are important to us. Through strengthened collaborative efforts we can achieve more, and planning activities around shared focal points not only gives us a sense of festivity and togetherness but strengthens the community, sense of tradition and imparts knowledge to future generations going forward.
International Day of Light (IDL)
Following the highly successful International Year of Light (IYL) 2015, the Executive Board of UNESCO endorsed a proposal for an enduring follow-up in the form of an annual IDL to be celebrated on 16 May every year from 2018 following its official Proclamation at the General Conference of UNESCO in November 2017. The purpose of the IDL will be to provide an annual focal point for the continued appreciation of the central role that light plays in the lives of the citizens of the world in areas of science, culture, education, sustainable development, and in field as diverse as medicine, communications, and energy.
International Commission for Optics (ICO)
The ICO has applied to become an International Scientific Union of the International Council for Science (ICSU). The ICO represents optics on an international level incorporating over 50 national optical associations and organizations including, in addition to the EOS itself; the American National Academy of Sciences (NAS), the Optical Society of America (OSA), the Ibero-American Network of Optics (RIAO), the African Laser Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Sciences Network (LAM NETWORK), the International Society on Optics Within Life Sciences (OWLS), and the International Society for Optics and Photonics (SPIE).
ICO’s membership as a scientific union would enhance the benefits of current ICSU territories through strengthened collaborative efforts of international research, as well as programs and events promoting optics, photonics and engineering. Such collaborations have been created between the ICO and the International Center for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) in Trieste, Italy. The successful launch of the IYL 2015 is another example of joint efforts in promoting science internationally for the wellbeing of humanity.
Elina Koistinen
Communications Manager
European Optical Society
EOS conferences at the World of Photonics Congress
Duration: 26 June 2017–29 June 2017
Location: Munich, Germany
The EOS has once again organized the four already established conferences for the World of Photonics Congress, which will be held in Munich from the 26 to 29 June 2017. For the first time, the conferences appear under the same title of Optical Technologies.
These conferences include:
5th Conference on Manufacturing of Optical Systems
4th Conference on Optofluidics
2nd Conference on Light Engineering
2nd Conference on Optomechanical Engineering
Submissions can be submitted for both oral and poster presentations.
Industrial poster session
In addition to these traditional presentations, the conference on Manufacturing of Optical Systems, for the first time, includes an industrial poster session where companies are entitled to present their key technology competences on a poster that will be presented over the duration of the conference in the conference session room. Posters presenting competences and know how rather than products will be preferred.
Pre-registration opens 2 March, 2017.
Website: http://www.myeos.org/events/WPC2017
EOS Topical Meeting on Diffractive Optics 2017
Duration: 4 September 2017–7 September 2017
Location: Joensuu, Finland
The conference will be held in Joensuu, Finland, a part of the Lake District and the region of North Karelia. This topical meeting series on diffractive optics was established by the present program co-chairs in 1995, the inaugural meeting of which was held in Prague. The series continued on a biannual basis thereafter. Recently, however, a decision was made by the EOS to re-establish it as an independent EOS Topical Meeting, again to be held biennially.
The scope of the meeting covers all fundamental and applied aspects of diffractive optics and related fields. The conference also includes an excursion to the Lake District of Finland to the town of Savonlinna to visit one of the greatest medieval war castles ever built.
Website: http://www.myeos.org/events/do2017
©2017 THOSS Media & De Gruyter
