Every year, researchers, students and industrialists come together for the Prix Jean Jerphagnon, which rewards innovation in optics-photonics. The jury and its president, Alain Aspect, professor at the Institut d'Optique and member of the Académie des Technologies, awarded the prize to Antoine Dubrouil, physicist and founder of Femto Easy.
Antoine Dubrouil holds a PhD in laser physics, specializing in ultrafast lasers. His PhD, obtained at the Centre Lasers Intenses et Applications (Celia) in 2011, focused on the research, production, characterization and use of fast laser pulses from a few femtoseconds to attoseconds. These unprecedented temporal resolutions, previously unattainable by humans, opened the way to new applications in fundamental research, industry and medicine.
Antoine Dubrouil developed a new laser source based on post-compression and decided to do a post-doc in Australia at Swinburne University of Technology. There, he realized that the measuring instruments available on the market only partially met the needs of researchers.
The researcher then began to develop his own tools based on new concepts, which he continued to explore in Italy at Politecnico di Milano for a second post-doc. In 2014, he returned to Celia with the ambition of creating a company based on his work, Femto Easy, which he will launch in 2016.
His company devotes a large part of its activity to R&D, developing measuring instruments for ultrafast (femtosecond) lasers that are both easy to use and highly reliable. Unlike state-of-the-art devices, which require precise alignment to obtain a measurement, its products can be placed directly in the laser beam, obtaining a measurement in a matter of seconds.
The Jean Jerphagnon award ceremony is part of the Rendez-vous Optique-Photonique pour l'industrie du futur organized by the Institut Mines-Télécom and the Académie des Technologies. Broadcast this year via a webinar on July 9, these events highlight technological innovations in a wide range of industries.
The Prix Jean Jerphagnon, organized by ITM and the Académie des Technologies with the support of the Fondation Mines-Télécom, is intended to honor the memory and extend the work of Jean Jerphagnon, who passed away in 2005 and led a remarkable career, from basic research to innovation, in the field of optics and photonics. The €10,000 prize aims to promote technological innovation and the dissemination of optics and photonics in all fields of application. It is awarded to a researcher or engineer aged 40 or under who proposes an innovative project with high scientific value or industrial potential, marking a milestone in his or her career, and involving at least one element of optics or photonics.