Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) photonics professor Christian Koos received the 2012 Alfried Krupp Prize for Young University Teachers. The €1 million (about $1.3 million) annual prize was awarded by the Alfried Krupp von Bohlen and Halback Foundation board of trustees. The award is intended to enable researchers to improve their working environment within a five-year period independent of public funding and to advance their research and teaching work. Koos’ work focuses on hybrid integration methods to combine silicon waveguides with organic materials. The focus of the research is reducing the Internet’s energy consumption. Prior to accepting the professorship for photonic communication technology at KIT, he headed the Nanotechnology and Metrology divisions within the Corporate Research and Technology Department of Carl Zeiss AG. He has more than 100 cited publications and has applied for more than 15 patents. In June 2011, he was granted a €1.5 million ERC starting grant from the European Union. For more information, visit: www.kit.edu