Investigators

Polina Bayvel is a professor in optical communications and head of the Optical Networks Group at the Electronic & Electrical Engineering Department in UCL. In 2016, Prof. Bayvel was elected a fellow of the Royal Society. Prof. Bayvel's research focuses on theoretical and experimental investigation of high-speed (10-160 Gbit/s and beyond), multiwavelength, optically amplified telecommunications networks including: (i) optical network design, wavelength allocation and routing algorithms, (ii) study of high-speed transmission systems and impairments due to optical fibre nonlinearities and their mitigation, using a variety of techniques, including use of advanced modulation formats, electronic pre-distortion, coherent detection and digital signal processing, optical equalisation and regeneration, and new devices for optical network applications.

p.bayvel[at]ucl.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7679 7921
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Watch Prof Bayvel's Clifford Paterson Lecture at the Royal Society

Sergei Turitsyn is a Professor in Photonics, Electrical, Electronic and Power Engineering at the School of Engineering and Applied Science in Aston University. His main research interests lie in the field of nonlinear science, including soliton theory, self-focusing of light beams, discrete nonlinear systems, and nonlinear fibre optics. Recently, his focus has been on high-speed optical communications, nonlinear photonic devices, Raman-based technologies, and ultra-long fibre lasers.

s.k.turitsyn[at]aston.ac.uk
+44 (0)121 204 3538
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Watch Prof Turitsyn's Inagural Lecture

andrew.ellis[at]aston.ac.uk
+44 (0)121 204 3075
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Watch: Aston Scholars featuring Prof. Andrew Ellis

Stylianos Sygletos is a research fellow at the Aston Institute for Photonic Technologies. Within UNLOC, he is involved in the second and fourth research themes of the project.

s.sygletos[at]aston.ac.uk
+44 (0)12 1204 3721
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Benn Thomsen moved to Microsoft Research Lab - Cambridge in March 2017 after a successful 13 years as a lecturer and a member of the Optical Networks Group at the Electronic & Electrical Engineering Department in UCL. Benn's main areas of research include ultrashort pulse generation, complete characterization of optical pulses using spectrographic techniques, all-optical signal processing, dynamic optical network architectures, and physical layer subsystems for dynamic optical networks. Benn continues at UCL as an Honorary Reader.

b.thomsen[at]ucl.ac.uk
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Watch Dr Thomsen's UCL Lecture: Scenario-based learning in Electronic and Electrical Engineering

Dr. Killey is a senior lecturer at the Electronic & Electrical Engineering Department in UCL. His main research interests are: (i) Modelling and experimental investigation of the effects of fibre nonlinearity on high bit-rate WDM data transmission, (ii) Applications of digital signal processing for transmission impairment mitigation in high capacity optical communication systems, (iii) Implementation of high speed digital signal processing for optical communications using field programmable gate arrays, and (iv) Analysis of wavelength routing in high-capacity optically amplified WDM networks. Robert is the leader of the second research theme within the UNLOC project focused on developing advanced techniques of coding, digital signal processing and nonlinearity management in coherent transmission to maximise spectral efficiency.

r.killey[at]ucl.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7679 3979
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Paul Harper is a reader at the School of Engineering and Applied Science in Aston University. His main research interests include high speed optical communications and nonlinear optics. He teaches Foundations of Physics & Engineering, Digital Media Science, and Optical Communications Systems.

p.harper[at]aston.ac.uk
+44 (0)121 204 3525
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Philip Watts is a lecturer in the Electronic & Electrical Engineering Department in UCL. His current research involves investigating the performance and power consumption implications of integrated photonic interconnect for future large scale computer systems (such as data centres and high performance scientific computing) focusing on: (i) Performance modelling of computer systems with photonic networks using software simulation and FPGA-based full system emulation, (ii) Power modeling and experimental verification of integrated photonic components and electronic network elements, and (iii) Design of power optimised physical and data link layer protocols for photonic interconnect. Philip co-leads the third research theme in UNLOC with Benn Thomsen in investigating ways to maximise the capacity in the context of optical networks.

philip.watts[at]ucl.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7679 2824
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After more than a decade at UCL, Seb moved to Cambridge in January 2015. Seb's research interests include:

• Digital signal processing and its application to optical communications
• Optical transmission systems
• Polarisation effects in fibres
• Optical network topology

Within UNLOC, Seb is currently involved in research on Raman amplification, RT3 (networking and energy consumption), RT2 (DSP and dealing with uncertainties) as well as elements of experimental verification within RT4.

sjs1001[at]eng.cam.ac.uk
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Lin Zhang is a Professor in the School of Engineering & Applied Science at Aston University. Her main research area is advanced fibre grating devices, technologies and applications. Together with Prof. Turitsyn, Lin leads the first research theme in UNLOC focused on the development of fundamental information theory for nonlinear channels in order to characterize Shannon capacity for nonlinear fibre channels.

l.zhang[at]aston.ac.uk
+44 (0)121 204 3548
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Watch Prof. Zhang's Inagural Lecture

Dr. Zhixin Liu is a lecturer and a member of the Optical Networks Group at the Electronic & Electrical Engineering Department in UCL. His research aims to investigate optical components and subsystems for enabling larger data transmission capacities with a simultaneous reduction in power consumption and system complexity. His research interests include: (i) Optical transmitters for short and medium reach optical communication systems; (ii) Optical transmission system based on microstructure fibres; (iii) Digital and analog signal processing for low latency and power-aware optical communications.

zhixin.liu[at]ucl.ac.uk
+44 (0)20 7679 3369
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