For one week, Milan will be the international capital of laser science.
From 30 August to 5 September 2026, the Institute of Photonics and Nanotechnology of the National Research Council (CNR-IFN) and the Department of Physics at the Politecnico di Milano are hosting the Siegman International School on Lasers, an international school organised by Optica, the global scientific society for optics and photonics formerly known as the Optical Society of America. Fifty-seven students have been admitted, hailing from 25 countries across all continents and selected from applications received from around the world.
The school is named after Anthony Siegman, former president of Optica and author of one of the seminal texts on laser physics, who, throughout his career, devoted considerable attention to training the next generation of researchers.
Founded in this spirit, the school brings together students and lecturers from academia and industry every year for a week of intensive training on all aspects of lasers and their applications.
The 2026 edition is organised by Shane Eaton, Cristian Manzoni and Francesco Canella of CNR-IFN and by Giulio Cerullo of the Department of Physics at the Politecnico di Milano.
The programme features lectures by 16 international speakers from leading research centres and companies in the sector, including Franz Kärtner (DESY and the University of Hamburg), Carlo Sirtori (École Normale Supérieure, Paris), Paul Barclay (University of Calgary), Jim Kafka (Spectra-Physics/MKS), Daniele Brida (University of Luxembourg), Reina Yoshizaki (University of Tokyo), Piotr Maślowski (Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń), as well as researchers from the CNR-IFN and the Politecnico di Milano.
Friday 4 September is dedicated to the memory of Orazio Svelto, who passed away last January at the age of 89. A pioneer of laser research in Italy, Svelto built one of the first ruby lasers at Stanford in 1961 and, upon his return to Italy, founded the research group at the Milan Polytechnic from which the CNR’s Centre for Quantum Electronics and Electronic Instrumentation – now part of the Institute of Photonics and Nanotechnologies – and the Milan school of quantum optics would emerge.
Author of Principles of Lasers, a standard reference work adopted by dozens of universities around the world, he also played a decisive role in the development of the Department of Physics at the Politecnico di Milano and in the establishment of the degree course in Engineering Physics.
Jim Kafka (Spectra-Physics/MKS) and Roberta Ramponi (CNR-IFN) will pay tribute to him in front of the school’s students, with two talks dedicated to his life and his scientific, personal and educational legacy.
«The Siegman School is much more than a series of lectures: it is the week when a generation of young students meets the people who have shaped today’s photonics and the colleagues with whom they will shape tomorrow’s,» explains Shane Eaton, a researcher at CNR-IFN and coordinator of the school. «Having 57 students from 25 countries in our laboratories means bringing a significant part of the future of laser research to Milan for a week.»
Alongside the lectures, the programme devotes considerable time to practical training: students will take part in lab tours in small groups at the CNR-IFN and Politecnico di Milano laboratories, gaining hands-on experience with ultrafast laser sources, non-linear optics, pulse characterisation and laser micromachining. The companies Dynamic Optics and NIREOS, as well as the Optica Student Chapter, are also contributing to the hands-on activities, supporting the students during the experimental sessions.
Poster sessions dedicated to students’ work and sponsoring companies allow participants to present their research and engage directly with representatives from the European and international photonics industry, in a setting that encourages networking and the formation of new scientific and professional collaborations.
The programme also includes a cultural exchange programme, designed to introduce participants to Milan and to strengthen ties between the various scientific communities represented: from an evening at the Balera dell’Ortica, a venue symbolic of Milanese folk tradition, to a city tour aboard a historic tram.
The school is made possible thanks to the support of numerous industrial partners and research institutions: Edmund Optics, Optoprim, Gestione SILO, Menhir Photonics, Amplitude Systèmes, K2 Photonics, Thorlabs, Fibercryst, Amplight, Bright Solutions, Nanoscribe and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.