Researchers receive 'Oscar of Invention' for microscope
CSU engineering professor receives top honors
Colorado State University Professor Carmen Menoni, whose tabletop microscope recently won top honors from R&D Magazine, has been named a Fellow of two major scientific organizations: the American Physical Society and the Optical Society of America. Menoni joins a select group of colleagues who are chosen by their peers for the distinctive honors. Fewer than one-half of 1 percent of the 46,000 members in the American Physical Society are named as Fellows. Menoni was honored for advancing nano-scale imaging using extreme ultraviolet laser light and seminal contributions to understanding the physics of semiconductor optical materials and laser diodes. The Optical Society of America also named Menoni as a Fellow for contributions to nanoscale resolution imaging using compact extreme ultraviolet lasers and the understanding of semiconductor optical materials and devices. Menoni was one of 61 Fellows selected this year by the optical society. The organization, which has more than 70,000 professional members from 134 countries, promotes the science of light and the advanced technologies made possible by optics and photonics.
A tabletop microscope developed by a team of Colorado State and Berkeley researchers has been recognized by R&D Magazine as one of the Top 100 most significant technological advances for 2008. The microscope uses light beams of wavelength 10 times shorter than visible light – known as extreme ultraviolet light – to “see” objects 1,000 times smaller than a human hair.
The researchers received the R&D 100 award in October at a ceremony dubbed “the Oscars of Invention” by the Chicago Tribune. Led by CSU electrical and computer engineering professor Carmen Menoni, the collaborative innovation incorporates an extreme ultraviolet laser invented at CSU, specialized lenses created at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and mirrors developed at the Lebedev Physical Institute in Moscow.
The research was conducted at the CSU-based National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center for Extreme Ultraviolet Science and Technology and supported by a $4 million annual grant from the NSF. The center combines the complementary expertise of researchers at Colorado State, Berkeley, and the University of Colorado-Boulder, who are among the world leaders in developing compact extreme ultraviolet coherent light sources and optical systems for nanoscience and nanotechnology applications. Several of the nation’s largest computer chip manufacturers and laser, optics, and nanotechnology companies are industrial members of the center.
The extreme ultraviolet microscope uses its laser for “stop-action” image capture on the time scale of a billionth of a second (one nanosecond). Unlike electron microscopes, it allows imaging of objects in the midst of applied electromagnetic fields. No other compact imaging instrument allows these capabilities at comparable resolutions.
|
