Optifab 2017 Connects Industry and Academia

JUSTINE MURPHY, SENIOR EDITOR, justine.murphy@photonics.com

Optifab, the largest optical manufacturing conference and exhibition in North America, is fast approaching. Organized jointly by SPIE and the American Precision Optics Manufacturers Association, the event will be held Oct. 16-19 at the Rochester Riverside Convention Center in Rochester, N.Y.

This biennial event has a technical focus on classical and advanced optical manufacturing technologies, and brings together industry and academia, and features plenary speakers and presentations, as well as varied level training courses led by some of the industry’s top optical manufacturing experts. Among them are renowned optics professor Alexis Vogt, precision optics specialist Ray Williamson, and Savvy Optics Corp. president David Aikens, among others. Courses include Fastening Optical Elements with Adhesives, Optical Scatter Metrology for Industry, Understanding Scratch and Dig Specifications, Introduction to Modern Optical Drawings (ISO 10110 standard), and Optical Manufacturing Fundamentals. The courses are held throughout the conference, and some will be available in an online format.

Numerous conference sessions and tracks offer additional training and learning opportunities, in topics ranging from metrology, manufacturing fundamentals, and grinding and polishing processes, to molding, diamond turning, and coating and cleaning techniques. Those presenting hail from Corning Inc., the University of Rochester, Trioptics, Asphericon, Sigmadyne Inc., and Optimax Systems.

Also scheduled are plenary sessions with engineers and educators including Christian Schindler, project manager for optical manufacturing technologies development at Carl Zeiss Jena GmbH in Germany. He will discuss freeform optics and the current challenges for future serial production. Heinrich Grüger, an enginner at Fraunhofer-Institut für Photonische Mikrosysteme in Germany, will speak about a new approach to realizing complex optical systems in high volume.

The winners of the 2016 Rudolf Kingslake Medal and Prize will be presented during the conference. Those receiving the honor for their co-authored paper — “Interference microscope objectives for wide-field areal surface topography measurements” — are Peter de Groot, executive director of R&D at Zygo Corp., whose research focuses on optical metrology, and James F. Biegen, a Zygo Corp. senior technician who specializes in the optical design of advanced metrology instrumentation. The paper was published in the July 2016 issue of SPIE’s Optical Engineering journal.

Poster sessions and a job fair will offer visibility for students and job seekers, allowing them to network with prospective employers and peers. Job fair exhibitors include Harris Technology, United Lens Co., Thorlabs, and more. And Optifab’s large exhibition connects researchers, scientists and engineers with potential suppliers. Nearly 200 companies from throughout North America and around the world will exhibit new and existing technologies, as well as new technical possibilities and solutions.

For more information, visit spie.org/conferences-and-exhibitions/optifab.