We couldn’t understand modern medicine without photons as a tool to diagnose and treat patients. In the hospital where I work as a physician, thanks to the optical fibers of endoscopes, we can access places hidden inside the bodies of our patients without the need for invasive procedures. Various sensors and imaging techniques allow us to see and obtain information from within the bodies to be able to diagnose more accurately. In recent years, lasers have become an essential tool in many operating rooms for extreme precision surgery. And we haven’t even started talking about the therapies that nanophotonics enables!

I don’t know how I would do it without the internet: all the music I listen to, the stories I read, the photos I share with friends, the videos I watch, … everything is in the cloud!

Did you know that the cloud is not as ethereal as its name suggests?

To distribute information  in an ultrafast way around the world, we need an optical fiber network that physically connects all continents and cities, running even on the ocean floor. In this way, the enormous amount of data that is sent every second can reach our devices in no time, be it the data needed to run a hospital or a video of kittens, and all transported by photons!

I work in the quality control department of a food company and photonics is an ideal tool for our work, because it allows us to do our analyses in a non-invasive way, without damaging the products. We use photonic systems for very different processes, from controlling the shape and color of fruits and vegetables, to measuring the amount of oxygen inside the packages to make sure that the food inside does not decay too soon. Some of our suppliers also use photons to monitor the crops and optimize harvests.

ICFO is a research center of excellence with research lines that encompass diverse areas in which photonics plays a decisive role.

Theoretical and experimental scientists come together in our facility located in the Mediterranean Technology Park in the metropolitan area of Barcelona. They work in 80 state-of-the-art research laboratories with an emphasis on basic and applied themes relevant to medicine and biology, advanced imaging techniques, information technologies and a range of environmental sensors, tunable and ultra-fast lasers, quantum science, photovoltaics and the properties and applications of nano-materials such as graphene, among others.

If we split the diameter of a hair into a thousand parts, we would get to the scale of the nanoparticles that are made in ICFO. Despite being so small, these particles are useful for different innovative technologies.

At ICFO, many people are exploring the nanoworld, trying to improve our knowledge of the new phenomena that emerge at this tiny scale. They also aim to develop new technologies, such as new materials for mobile phones and wearable devices, diagnostics and treatment of diseases, sensors of photons and solar cells.

Photo: Carbon structure seen with an electron microscope. Some nanotubes can be seen inside the "cave".

Sunlight is a free and inexhaustible source of energy that we must learn to use efficiently, especially in the current context of climate emergency.

At ICFO, several people are studying new materials to create transparent and/or flexible solar cells that would allow us to obtain energy from places that currently aren’t used for the generation of energy. For example, they could be integrated into electric cars to increase their autonomy or into the windows of buildings to maximize the surface area of sunlight capture and therefore energy production. They could also be integrated into clothing or wearable devices, reducing the size of batteries and therefore of the object.

Photo: The square of different color on the O of the ICFO logo is a transparent solar cell

ICFO encourages society to be part of the scientific community through rigorous scientific experiments that require citizen participation, making society aware of the importance of science in an attractive way, and enabling everyone to significantly contribute to scientific research.

In recent years, ICFO has coordinated various citizen science experiments, such as the BIG Bell Test, involving more than 100,000 citizens in a series of cutting-edge quantum physics experiments conducted in 12 leading laboratories around the world. It also organized NightUp Castelldefels, a pilot experiment to test whether we can use the sensors in mobile phones to gather useful data for studies on light pollution.

Photo: Citizens participating in NightUp Castelldefels.

Unlike radio or TV talk shows, in science not all opinions have the same value. Only if you can support your thesis with experimental evidence and logical reasoning your discovery will be accepted by the scientific community.
Therefore, journals publishing scientific results use the principle of peer review: a new result can only be published if it is accepted by a group of experts in that field who carefully examine the methods and conclusions of that research.
Does it make sense to adopt this system or does it slow down the flow of useful new knowledge that should be shared quickly, such as new discoveries about the SARS-CoV-2 virus?

Science is an international activity: the vast majority of scientific discoveries are made by multinational teams and result from collaborations between institutes and companies in different countries.

People in the world of science often move to expand their experience, so it is very common to find people from different countries in a research center. The cultural mix creates an open and tolerant environment that helps the creation of new and original ideas that allow research advancement.

So does it make sense to associate an important scientific discovery with a country, as we can often read in the news?

The pandemic that arose in 2020 taught us that public health is an important sector that affects many more aspects of society. A tiny virus can affect the lives of millions of people in all its aspects, not only health, but also the economy, industrial structure, labor market ...

That’s why it’s important to focus most of our efforts on research projects that can improve and care for people’s health.

We live in the information age. More and more companies and institutions are collecting and analyzing large amounts of data to improve industrial processes and services for the population. In addition, digital technologies are essential to communicate with each other, whether for work or fun. If information systems fail, strategic structures such as energy networks, traffic control, hospitals, governments, etc. fail, too. Thus, ensuring data security for quick and massive data transfer is of fundamental importance for a digitized society like ours.

That is why it is important to focus most of our efforts on research projects that can improve data collection, analysis, transmission and security.

We are in the middle of a climate emergency: to be able to solve it we need new environmental policies and the commitment of society as a whole. Science and technology can accelerate the change of paradigm that we need to save the planet with discoveries and innovative technologies. If we do nothing now, the Earth will be uninhabitable and unsustainable, but there’s still time.

That’s why it’s important to focus most of our efforts on research projects that can help us take care of our planet.

Photonics is everywhere and has a positive impact in many different aspects of our lives. Sometimes, the same technology (such as the laser) can improve health, information and care for the environment at the same time. There are many global issues and it is difficult to set a priority, especially because they are interconnected.

That’s why it’s important not to focus our efforts on a single field of application: it’s better to diversify our efforts to have more chances of success.