Ground-breaking career of Faculty Principal celebrated at conference finale

Physicist honoured by peers at special dinner event<em> - News</em>

By Danielle Reeves
Thursday 6 September 2007

The work of Professor Sir Peter Knight , Principal of Imperial's Faculty of Natural Sciences, was celebrated at a special dinner event held in his honour last night.

The event, which took place aboard Thames river cruiser the Silver Sturgeon, closed the three-day Photons, Atoms and Qubits 2007 conference at the Royal Society this week. Conference speakers, delegates and VIP guests from the international physics community gathered on the boat to hear Professor Artur Ekert of the National University of Singapore and the University of Oxford deliver a speech in honour of Sir Peter's illustrious research career in the field of quantum optics.

Organised by physicists from Imperial, the conference saw a prestigious list of speakers from around the world addressing over 250 delegates on the latest developments in quantum physics, including quantum optics, quantum information and strong field science. VIP speakers included two Nobel Laureates: Claude Cohen-Tannoudji who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1997 for the development of methods to cool and trap atoms with laser light; and Roy Glauber who won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2005 for his contribution to the quantum theory of optical coherence. Many of the speakers focused on areas from Sir Peter's portfolio of research interests.

Sir Peter said: "I'm delighted to have been invited to spend the evening in the company of so many eminent scientists, at the end of what has been a fascinating conference with a world-class series of speakers - it's a real honour for me to play a role in this closing dinner event."

Dr Jens Eisert   from Imperial's Department of Physics, who led the organisation team for both the conference and last night's finale dinner event, added: "Sir Peter is a world leading scientist in this field, so it seemed only fitting that we close the conference with a fantastic social event incorporating a celebration of his career to date. I’m sure everyone present will agree that it was a brilliant end to an extremely successful conference."

Sir Peter was knighted in the Queen's Birthday Honours list in 2005 for his work in optical physics. He is a Past-President of the Optical Society of America (OSA) and was for 7 years a member of their Board of Directors. He is a Director of the OSA Foundation and was past-chair of OSA's International Council. He was coordinator of the SERC Nonlinear Optics Initiative, past-chair of the EPS Quantum Electronics and Optics Division and Editor of the Journal of Modern Optics from 1987 to 2006. Earlier this year he was elected chair of the Science Board of the Science and Technology Facilities Council - the merged replacement of the PPARC and CCLRC funding councils.

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