WASHINGTON, Sept. 8 -- Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton will speak at Frontiers in Optics 2004, the 88th annual meeting of the Optical Society of America (OSA), to be held Oct. 10-14 in Rochester, N.Y. The conference will also feature a panel discussion by three Nobel Laureates: Steven Chu, director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory; Claude Cohen-Tannoudji, a physics professor at the Collège de France and École Normale Supérieure, Paris; and William Phillips, a researcher at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, in Gaithersburg, Md. The three physicists shared the 1997 Nobel Prize in physics for their development of methods to cool and trap atoms with laser light. Topics among the hundreds of abstracts that will be presented at a scientific program during the conference will include: an investigation into recent claims that early Renaissance masters used optical projections while painting; techniques based on light that can help determine malignant from nonmalignant breast cancer; using optics-based technology to identify cancer cells and high-risk arterial blocking; advances in holographic television; and laser guided adaptive optics for astronomy to improve ground-based telescopes. "The science of optics affects ordinary people in ways they may not recognize," OSA said. "The study of optics has ever-important applications for space exploration, detection of disease and homeland security. The development of the laser has revolutionized everything from watching television to correcting vision." OSA was founded in Rochester, where many of the field’s most prolific optics researchers live and work. The region is home to Kodak, Bausch & Lomb and Corning Inc. The Institute of Optics at the University of Rochester will mark its 75th anniversary that week. For more information, visit: www.frontiersinoptics.org