A bit more time on my hands… so let’s see what is new since last year. Hannah, Frédéric, and Tingting completed their stays in the lab and moved on, to grad school, continuing bachelor’s degree in Montréal, and a Faculty position in China, respectively. We welcomed Xiaohong Bai, a new visiting PhD student from Xian who is spending two years in the lab to work on plasmonic sensors. Fu has completed all the work relating to his PhD, wrote and published two papers (see “Research output” section and follow up News on this), and submitted a third one (under review). Two NSERC funded collaborative projects with industry concluded in 2019 and we have begun to work with another private sector partner (more on that later). Finally, just before travel restrictions came into effect I attended OFC 2020 in San Diego to present an invited talk entitled: Calibrated Fiber Grating Wavelength Combs Enable High Accuracy Biosensing.
COVID-wise, two more lab members (from Spain and China) were expected this month but the temporary lab closure and travel restrictions have put these visits on hold. We hope to see them in the coming months.