The purpose of the Special Session is to provide a forum for exchange of latest research and development results on optical micro-resonator theory, design and fabrication, with applications in many disciplines ranging from filters for WDM networks to low-threshold microlasers to quantum computing to optical biosensors. All scientists and engineers working in this broad area are invited to submit their research to the program of the special session. The program will include invited and contributed papers as well as poster presentations.

The suggested session topics include but are not limited to the following:

Whispering-gallery modes Microsphere and microdisk resonators Photonic crystal microcavities Microcavity shape engineering Photonic molecules Microcavity lasers and LEDs Semiconductor microcavity-quantum dot systems Coupled-resonator waveguides Microresonator-based bio(chemical)sensors In-situ tuning of microcavities Optical bistability in microcavity structures Optical information processing with microresonators Nonlinear processes in microcavities and coupled-cavity structures Cavity solitons Metallodielectric microcavities Microcavity-based slow-wave structures and optical memory elements Novel and improved analytical and numerical methods for microresonators design

Submission deadlines:

Abstract due: February 15, 2008
Full paper due: March 30, 2008

Please, send a short abstract (200-300 words) of the paper you would like i to present to SBoriskina@gmail.com by 15 Feb 2008 to make sure your contribution is included in the program of the Special Session. Then, follow the guidelines on the ICTON web-site for submission of a full paper ( www.itl.waw.pl/icton).

Confirmed invited presentations by:

John Donegan, Trinity College, Ireland
Mode manipulation in small microsphere systems

Alfred Driessen, University of Twente, The Netherlands
Propagation of short lightpulses in microring resonators

Takahisa Harayama, ATR Wave Engineering Laboratories, Japan
Title to be specified

Susumu Noda, Kyoto University, Japan
Title to be specified

Kerry J. Vahala, California Institute of Technology, USA
Title to be specified

Miguel Andres Bou, Universidad de Valencia, Burjassot, Spain
Microcapillary resonators with submicrometric wall

Trevor Benson, George Green Institute for Electromagnetics Research, University of Nottingham, UK
Numerical simulations of 3D micro-resonators

Romuald Brazis, Semiconductor Physics Institute, Vilnius, Lithuania
Trapping electromagnetic energy in the split-ring-cavity system

André Delâge, Institut des Sciences des Microstructures, Ottawa, Canada
Label-free biological sensors based on silicon ring resonators

Jordi Martorell, Institute of Photonic Sciences, Barcelona, Spain
Micro-resonators and whispering gallery modes

Reinhold Pregla, Fern Universität, Hagen, Germany
Analysis of optical resonator structures coupled by straight waveguides

Nataliya Sakhnenko, Kharkov National University of Radio Electronics, Kharkov, Ukraine
Optical coupling of two microcavities with time-varying properties

George A. Stanciu, Universitatea Politehnica din Bucuresti, Romania
Investigation on photonic-corral-mode quantum ring lasers by laser scanning microscopy

Contributions announced by:

X.-W. Wu, C.-L. Zou, Y. Yang, C.-H. Dong, Y.-F. Xiao, G.-C. Guo, Z.-F. Han, University of Science and Technology of China, China
Mode coupling strength in a microsphere cavity coupled with fiber taper

Y.-F. Xiao, C.-H. Dong, C.-L. Zou, Z.-F. Han, University of Science and Technology of China, China; L. Yang, Washington University St. Louis, USA; G.-C. Guo, University of Science and Technology of China, China
Inherently directional lasing from a thermal-induced-deformation high-Q microcavity

L. Xu, L. Shang, L. Liu, Fudan University, China
Single mode lasing from a coupled asymmetric microcavity

L. Liu, L. Shang, L. Xu, Fudan University, China
Laser emission with hybrid resonant mode from an active peanut-shaped microcavity

R. C. Pennington, G. D.Alessandro, J. J. Baumberg, M. Kaczmarek, University of Southampton, UK
Tracking spatial/spectral mode structures in novel hemispherical microcavities

R. Nett, W. Weigel, G. Schweiger, Ruhr-Universitaet Bochum, Germany
Microresonator array for wavelength sensing

H. Kwak, Y. Shin, S.-B. Lee, S.-Y. Lee, Seoul National University, Korea; J.-B. Shim, Max Plank Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Germany; S. W. Kim, Pusan National University, Korea; J.-H. Lee, K. An, Seoul National University, Korea
Visualization of quasi-resonance modes in a deformed ultrasonic cavity

S. Moon, J. Yang, S.-B. Lee, Seoul National University, Korea; J.-B. Shim, Max Plank Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Dresden, Germany; S. W. Kim, Pusan National University, Korea; J.-H. Lee, K. An, Seoul National University, Korea
Measurement of the boundary shape of a two-dimensional deformed microcavity with forward shadow diffraction

J. Yang, S.-B. Lee, S. Moon, S.-Y. Lee, Seoul National University, Korea; J.-B. Shim, Max Plank Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Germany; S. W. Kim, Pusan National University, Korea; J.-H. Lee, K. An, Seoul National University, Korea
Resonance-enhanced chaos-assisted optical pumping of a deformed microcavity

N. Djellali, M. Lebental, Ecole Normale Supérieure de Cachan, France; R. Dubertrand, C. Schmit, E. Bogomolny, Université Paris XI, France; J. Zyss, Ecole Normale Supérieure de Cachan, France
Spectra and periodic orbits in organic micro-lasers

R. Dubertrand, Université Paris XI, Orsay, France; M. Lebental, N. Djellali, J. Zyss, Ecole Normale Supérieure de Cachan, Cachan, France; C. Schmit, E. Bogomolny, Université Paris XI, Orsay, France
Perturbation study of resonances for nearly circular micro-cavities

T.-Y. Kwon, M. Hentschel, Max Plank Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, Germany
Effect of active medium on classical phase space in microcavity laser systems

C. Ferrari, Politecnico di Milano, Italy; F. Morichetti, CORECOM, Italy; A. Melloni, M. Martinelli, Politecnico di Milano, Italy
Phase disorder in coupled-resonator optical waveguides

S. Kiravittaya, Max-Planck-Insitute für Festkörperforschung, Germany; A. Bernardi, Institut de Ciencia de Materials de Barcelona-CSIC, Spain; A. Rastelli, Institute for Integrative Nanosciences, Germany; R. Songmuang, Max-Planck-Insitute für Festkörperforschung, Germany; D.J. Thurmer, M. Benyoucef, O.G. Schmidt, Institute for Integrative Nanosciences, Germany
Numerical investigation of optical response from rolled-up microtube resonator and its application

H.G.L. Schwefel, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany; C.G. Poulton, University of Technology, Australia; L.J. Wang, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany
Efficient multipole method for photonic molecules

S. Preu, H.G.L. Schwefel, S. Malzer, G.H. Döhler, L.J. Wang, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany; M. Hanson, J.D. Zimmerman, A.C. Gossard, University of California Santa Barbara, USA
Photonic molecules in the Terahertz . Mode splitting in coupled dielectric WG resonators

R. Sharma, J.P. Mondia, J. Schäfer, Z.H. Lu, L.J. Wang, Institute of Optics, Information and Photonics, Max-Planck Research Group and University Erlangen-Nuremburg, Germany
Microdrop lasers based on quantum dots and nanowires

V.N. Derkach, R.V. Golovashchenko, E.V. Goroshko, Usikov Institute of Radiophysics and Electronics NASU, Ukraine
Coupled-cavity structures on the base of whispering gallery disk dielectric resonators at millimeter wave band

A.K. Popov, University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, USA; S.A. Myslivets, Institute of Physics, Krasnoyarsk, Russia; V.M. Shalaev, Birk Nanotechnology Center and Purdue University, USA
Mirrorless parametric oscillations in doped negative-index microstructures

Y.-Z. Huang, S.-J. Wang, K.-J. Che, Y.-H. Hu, Y. Du, L.-J. Yu, Institute of Semiconductors CAS, China
Characteristics of triangle and square InP/InGaAsP microlasers

Special Session history:

1^st Special Session: ICTON'06 - Nottingham, UK, June 2006

The session featured over 30 participants from the USA, UK, Ireland, China, Germany, Ukraine, Belarus, Korea, Japan, Italy, and Switzerland. The session program included several invited lectures presented by our keynote speakers: Vasily N. Astratov (University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA), Toshihiko Baba (Yokohama National University, Japan), Richard Chang (Yale University, USA), John Donegan (Trinity College, Ireland), Evgenii Narimanov (Princeton University, USA), Alexander I. Nosich (Institute of Radiophysics and Electronics NASU, Ukraine), and Jelena Vuckovic (Stanford University, USA). The lectures provided informative perspectives on current trends in microcavity research. Ways to achieve low thresholds and directional emission from microcavity lasers, amazing opportunities offered by complex coupled-cavity structures, and the role of microcavities in classical and quantum information processing were among the issues discussed. A number of contributed presentations focused on the field's hottest topics, including microresonators design for specific applications such as optical switching, filtering, biosensing, and waveguide dispersion modification.
A report on the work of the 2006 Special Session appeared in the October 2006 issue of LEOS Newsletter; a complete 2006 session technical program is available here.
 

2^nd Special Session: ICTON'07 - Rome, Italy, July 2007

Session technical program included 42 papers and featured leading experts in the field from USA, Ireland, UK, China, Germany, Ukraine, Russia, Korea, Japan, Italy, Greece, Iran, and Switzerland. Invited lectures were presented by Vasily N. Astratov (University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA), Takahisa Harayama (ATR Wave Engineering Laboratories, Japan), Andrey Matsko (Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, USA), Francesco Morichetti (Politecnico di Milano, Italy), and Hakan Tureci (ETH Zurich, Switzerland). The speakers highlighted recent progress in fabrication, characterization, and applications of ultra-high-Q crystalline WG-mode resonators as well as latest advances in theory and design of semiconductor microcavity lasers and random lasers. Furthermore, applications of 1-D, 2-D and 3-D coupled-cavity structures for efficient light transfer, routing and splitting, and for the enhancement of Doppler-effect-induced frequency shifts of optical signals in electrooptic media have been discussed. Contributed talks and poster presentations covered a wide range of topics including nonlinear effects in optical microcavities; use of novel materials and/or innovative fabrication techniques for resonators manufacturing; possible ways of shaping emission patterns of microcavity lasers, in-situ tuning of microcavity characteristics, and reducing bend losses of coupled-resonator optical waveguides; observation of generalized Sagnac effect in rotating optical cavities and radiation-pressure-induced microcavity mode splitting, etc. A complete 2007 session technical program and photos taken by session participants in Rome are available here.

Questions should be addressed to Svetlana V. Boriskina
fax: 1 (831) 3087657, e-mail: SBoriskina@gmail.com, http://www.bio-page.org/boriskina/