Distinguished and Plenary Speaker Abstracts

Digging Deep

I will discuss how being made aware of an 1892 paper by Lord Rayleigh added a new focus for my research. Rayleigh's paper described an elegant method for solving the Laplace equation in 2D and 3D lattices. With David McKenzie and other colleagues I applied Rayleigh's method to transport properties of composite materials. The method was naturally extended to photonic crystals in the context of the Helmholtz equation, and then to metamaterials. It then provided a powerful insight into the properties of microstructured optical fibres. With colleagues in Liverpool, we extended the Rayleigh multipole method to elastodynamics and then to the biharmonic equation and the study of platonic crystals. A part of these extensions of the technique was the study of methods for accurately calculating lattice sums. Taking the 1892 paper as a starting point and digging deeper provided a powerful stimulus towards enhancing my research and increasing its impact.

Biography

Professor Ross C.McPhedran is an Emeritus Professor at the University of Sydney, which he joined in 1975 after completing his PhD at the University of Tasmania in 1973 and a one year CSIRO Post Doctoral Fellowship at the Université Aix Marseille. His early research was in the electromagnetic theory of wave scattering by diffraction gratings, and was broadened when he joined a research group working on photothermal solar energy at the School of Physics at the University of Sydney to include the physics and mathematics of composite materials. He was instrumental in developing a multipole technique due to Lord Rayleigh for applications in the transport properties such as electrical and thermal conductivity of composite materials. The extensions of the Rayleigh multipole method into wave scattering problems for different types of waves (electromagnetic, optical, elastic, acoustic etc) has formed a major theme of his research. Applications have included photonic and phononic crystals, and metamamaterials. Professor McPhedran is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science and a Life Member of the Australian Institute of Physics and the Australian Optical Society. He has been awarded the Rolf Landauer Medal of the International ETOPIM Society for his research and leadership in the field of composite materials, and the W.H. Steel Medal of the Australian Optical Society. He was a co-founder of the KozWaves series of conferences. He has published over three hundred research articles in international journals, two books and has over 23000 citations, with an h index of 74.

Floquet Metasurfaces

Metasurfaces have emerged as a powerful platform to manipulate light, from the nanoscale to the far-field. They rely on careful spatial structuring at the nanoscale, which can control to a large extent the optical wavefront in space and momentum. Here, I discuss our recent efforts in the context of adding time as an additional degree of freedom to manipulate light with metasurfaces. By combining the strong light-matter interactions enabled by spatial structuring, and their large control over the spatial information, with temporal variations and non-equilibrium dynamics, we unveil exciting opportunities for nanophotonics and electromagnetics. We rely on processed mediated by polaritonic responses, leveraging excitonic, phononic, electronic and magnonic material responses coupled to engineered metasurfaces. In my talk, I will discuss our recent theoretical and experimental results in the context of time variations and parametric processes enabled by Floquet metasurfaces, the role of symmetries in their control, and their opportunities for technological advances. The combination of parametric processes, time reflections and spatial photonic engineering enables totally new opportunities in the quest to manipulate light in extreme ways within an ultrathin platform.

Biography

Andrea Alù is a Distinguished Professor at the City University of New York (CUNY), the Founding Director of the Photonics Initiative at the CUNY Advanced Science Research Center, and the Einstein Professor of Physics at the CUNY Graduate Center. He received his Laurea (2001) and PhD (2007) from the University of Roma Tre, Italy, and, after a postdoc at the University of Pennsylvania, he joined the faculty of the University of Texas at Austin in 2009, where he was the Temple Foundation Endowed Professor until Jan. 2018. Dr. Alù is a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI), the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), the Materials Research Society (MRS), Optica, the International Society for Optics and Photonics (SPIE) and the American Physical Society (APS). He is a Highly Cited Researcher since 2017, a Simons Investigator in Physics, the director of the Simons Collaboration on Extreme Wave Phenomena Based on Symmetries, and the Editor in Chief of Optical Materials Express. He has received several scientific awards, including the NSF Alan T. Waterman award, the Blavatnik National Award for Physical Sciences and Engineering, the IEEE Kiyo Tomiyasu Award, the ICO Prize in Optics, the Optica Max Born Award, the SPIE Mozi Award and the URSI Issac Koga Gold Medal.

Water waves modelling in offshore renewable energy farms–status and challenges, and what can AI bring to the table?

Ensuring a reliable future electricity supply while minimizing climate impact is among the most pressing global challenges. Offshore renewable energy systems hold substantial promise in meeting growing electricity demand. As of 2025, global installed offshore wind power capacity reached 83 GW—a remarkable 400% increase over the past five years. The majority of these installations are located in shallow waters and rely on fixed, bottom-mounted monopile foundations. However, over 80% of the accessible wind energy potential lies in deep waters, necessitating the deployment of wind turbines on floating platforms. Although floating offshore wind turbines (FOWTs) are still in an early stage of development compared to fixed offshore wind, several pilot farms have been successfully commissioned in recent years. Wave energy converters (WECs), designed to convert the energy of ocean waves into electricity, is another class of renewable technologies with great potential. To achieve economic viability, FOWTs or WECs are deployed in arrays or farms, allowing shared electrical infrastructure and reduced costs. The configuration of individual devices and the overall farm layout influence the wave field within the farm, which in turn affects device stability, dynamics, and performance. This is particularly critical for wave farms, where devices are highly dynamic and often operate in resonance with incoming waves. Interactions between WECs—through scattered and radiated waves—impact their motion and energy absorption. Extensive research has been devoted to modelling arrays of WECs and optimizing their layout and operational parameters using analytical, numerical, and experimental approaches. However, the complexity of these models increases rapidly with the number of interacting devices, and current methods are insufficient for simulating commercial-scale wave farms. In this talk, I will present an overview of the challenges associated with modelling water wave fields in offshore renewable energy farms, with a focus on WEC arrays. Current state-of-the art will be discussed, highlighting recent methodological advancements across different levels of fidelity. Particular emphasis will be placed on analytical techniques, including multiple clustering scattering methods and nearest-neighbour approaches. Data-driven techniques and machine learning are increasingly being applied to the modelling and prediction of offshore renewable energy systems. We will explore the capabilities these emerging methods offer and discuss promising directions for future research aimed at overcoming existing limitations.

Biography

Malin Göteman is a professor at the Department of Electrical Engineering, Uppsala University, Sweden. The overall aim of her research is to contribute to the development of offshore renewable energy technologies: wave energy and floating offshore wind, as well as the resilient integration of these emerging energy technologies into the electric grid. Her main focus areas are modelling and optimization of large-scale wave and offshore wind systems, in particular with respect to the hydrodynamical couplings between the devices and how this affects the performance of the farms. Prof. Göteman is a leading scholar in her field and regularly publishes in high-impact scientific journals, presents at prestigious international conferences, and has published two books in recent years. She frequently serves as opponent for PhD theses, reviewer for grant applications, or expert in evaluations of strategic research infrastructure investments. Apart from working closely with industry, she also has a strong interdisciplinary expertise and experience from a range of different scientific fields. This is showcased by her roles as deputy director of the Centre for Natural Hazards and Disaster Science, Sweden, deputy chair of the Centre for Gender Science, Uppsala University, and chair of the e-infrastructure committee at the Swedish Research Council.

Mathematics, Coupled Oscillators and Information: Hearing for the Deaf

Conventional microphone technology has long relied on linear, passive oscillator principles, even though nature repeatedly demonstrates that nonlinear, active processes enable organisms to perceive and process remarkably subtle sound patterns. In this presentation, we show how active and nonlinear dynamics can inspire novel approaches to artificial sensing, with hearing as a central example. We connect research frontiers in coupled oscillators, fluid dynamics, soundscape augmentation, and reservoir computing to outline pathways toward advanced sensing performance. Particular emphasis is placed on the dynamics of coupled MEMS resonators - both passive and actively driven - in fluidic environments, and on how these insights inform novel electro-mechanical transduction strategies that, in the case of cochlear implants, move beyond traditional LCR circuits. Alongside theoretical advances, we highlight new experimental methods, including continuation techniques recently developed for MEMS, and discuss emerging applications in biosensing. Although hearing provides the central example, the underlying principles and approaches extend far beyond the perception of acoustic signals and soundscapes, with potential impact across a wide spectrum of sensing and information-processing technologies. Rather than incrementally improving devices for those who can already hear, our aim is to open the door to provide Hearing for the Deaf - demonstrating that technology can both restore silence to sound and reveal entirely new dimensions of perception.

Biography

Dr Stefanie Gutschmidt is Professor in Dynamics and Vibrations in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Canterbury (UC), in Christchurch, New Zealand. She earned her doctoral degree in Applied Mechanics from Darmstadt University of Technology (Germany) in 2005. Prior to coming to UC in 2009 she was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel and the University of Liege, in Liege, Belgium, during which years she focused on and specialised in nonlinear coupled oscillator and array dynamics. Ongoing research activities revolve around the broad subjects of nonlinear dynamics & vibrations, MEMS and NEMS technology, coupled oscillators and array dynamics, fluid dynamics of arrays, fluid-structure interactions, bio-sensors, bio-acoustics, sound detection technology, energy harvesting technology, and more recently reservoir computing. Prof Gutschmidt is internationally networked and maintains numerous long-term research collaborations.

An overview of the use of the Wiener-Hopf method in wave scattering

In this talk an analytical tool called the Wiener-Hopf method will be introduced assuming no prior knowledge. The method stems from an elegant use of complex analysis and have been extensively used across different subject in mathematics including wave scattering. The aim is to introduce the types of problems that have been tackled using this method predominantly in acoustics. The starting point will be the Helmholtz equation and its discretization. Additionally, some uses in simple metamaterials with corners will be discussed. The advantages and difficulties encountered by the method will be addressed. Finally different extensions will be discussed. If there is time I will explain some new links to machine learning.

Biography

Dr Kisil is a Royal Society Dorothy Hodgkin Research Fellow at the University of Manchester. She received her PhD from the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Analysis from Trinity College, Cambridge. After the PhD, she was successful in securing a prestigious stipendiary three year Sultan Qaboos Research Fellowship at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. This was followed by a 5-year Dame Kathleen Ollerenshaw Fellowship at the University of Manchester. Her research is on developing analytical methods generalizing the Wiener-Hopf technique as well as providing a theoretical framework for approximate methods. She was the lead organizer of many international workshops most recently once sponsored by Banff International Research Station and in the Isaac Newton Institute, Cambridge.

Topological metasurfaces and photonic lattices

The miniaturisation of photonic technologies calls for the wise integration of photonic and material components to enable novel functionalities in chip-scale devices based on enhanced light-matter interactions. Topological metasurfaces have recently been proposed as a promising platform for coupling structured modes of light on-chip with solid-state matter excitations, establishing resilient forms of polaritonic transport. This talk will present heterogeneous topological interfaces and chiral-defect cavities created in planar metasurfaces through inhomogeneous patterning at subwavelength scales. These topological traps and guides offer impactful opportunities for controlling light-matter waves in their dimensional hierarchy, paving the way for topological polariton shaping, ultrathin structured light sources, and thermal management at the nanoscale.

Biography

Daria Smirnova received her Ph.D. in Physics in 2016 from the Australian National University (ANU), followed by research experience in the USA, Russia, Japan, and Australia. Since 2019, she has consecutively held two prestigious fellowships supported by the Australian Research Council: the Discovery Early Career Researcher Award and, currently, the Future Fellowship at ANU. Her research interests span nonlinear physics, topological wave theory, multipolar electrodynamics, and nanophotonics. The outstanding quality and impact of her work have been recognised nationally and internationally through awards from the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics, Scopus-Elsevier, L'Oréal-UNESCO, the Australian Academy of Science, and the Australian and New Zealand Optical Society.

Waves in nonlocal metamaterials

We review our work on using the concept of beyond-nearest-neighbor interactions (nonlocality) as a design tool for achieving rationally designed periodic composites (metamaterials) with effective properties that go beyond those of their ingredients. The designs are then manufactured, many by means of 3D laser nanoprinting, and characterized experimentally. Historically, we started by tailoring (e.g., roton-like) dispersion relations of Bloch waves in elasticity, acoustics, and electromagnetism. We then moved to the static regime in the same systems, where anomalous frozen evanescent Bloch waves lead to highly unusual behavior. Examples are generalized versions of Hooke's law, Hagen-Poiseuille's law, Ohm's law, and Fourier's law. The latter two correspond to the static limit of diffusion-type problems. However, using the idea of Bloch-wave dispersion relations with purely imaginary frequencies, we show that any (spatially) nonlocal time-dependent anomalous diffusion behavior can be achieved by designed beyond-nearest-neighbor interactions in periodic composites.

Biography

After completing his Diploma and PhD in physics at Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt (Germany) in 1986 and 1987, respectively, he spent two years as a postdoc at AT&T Bell Laboratories in Holmdel (U.S.A.). From 1990-1995 he was professor (C3) at Universität Dortmund (Germany), since 1995 he is professor (C4, later W3) at Institute of Applied Physics of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). Since 2001 he has a joint appointment as department head at Institute of Nanotechnology (INT) of KIT, since 2016 he has been one of three directors at INT. From 2001-2014 he was the coordinator of the DFG-Center for Functional Nanostructures (CFN) at KIT. Since 2018 he is spokesperson of the Cluster of Excellence 3D Matter Made to Order. His research interests comprise ultrafast optics, (extreme) nonlinear optics, optical laser lithography, photonic crystals, optical, mechanical, electronic, and thermodynamic metamaterials, as well as transformation physics. This research has led to various awards and honors, among which are the Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach Research Award 1993, the Baden-Württemberg Teaching Award 1998, the DFG Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Award 2000, the European Union René Descartes Prize 2005, the Baden-Württemberg Research Award 2005, the Carl Zeiss Research Award 2006, the Hector Research Award 2008, the SPIE Prism Award 2014 for the start-up company Nanoscribe GmbH, the Stifterverband Science Award – Erwin-Schrödinger Prize 2016, and the Technology Transfer Prize of the German Physical Society (DPG) 2018. In 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2020, and 2021 Clarivate Analytics listed him as "Highly Cited Researcher" (top 1%). He is Member of Leopoldina, the German Academy of Sciences (since 2006), Member of acatech, the National Academy of Science and Engineering (since 2019), Member of the Hector Fellow Academy (since 2013, President from 2016-2022), Fellow of the Max Planck School of Photonics (since 2019), Fellow of the Optical Society of America (since 2008), and Honorary Professor at Huazhong University of Science & Technology, Wuhan, China (since 2014).