Donna Strickland; Benjamin Schmitt & Joe Serio: Life Before the Big Bang

A special episode following the journey of a team of scientists as they seek to discover the origins of the universe in the frozen tundra of Antarctica. Plus: an interview with Nobel Prize winner Donna Strickland. Dr. Donna Strickland is a professor in the department of physics and astronomy at the University of Waterloo and one of the recipients of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2018 for developing chirped pulse amplification with her PhD advisor, Dr. Gerard Mourou. Benjamin L. Schmitt is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow and project development scientist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA). Joseph Serio is co-founder and vice president of Vertex Optics Inc. All Things Photonics is produced by Photonics Media and airs every other Tuesday. You can find links to the stories mentioned in the episode on our website, www.photonics.com/podcast.