The Optical Society (OSA) has named F. J. Duarte of Interferometric Optics (Rochester, NY) as the 2016 recipient of the David Richardson Medal for his "seminal contributions to the physics and technology of multiple-prism arrays for narrow-linewidth tunable laser oscillators and laser pulse compression."
The OSA David Richardson medal has been presented yearly, since 1966, in recognition of those who have made significant contributions to optical engineering, primarily in the commercial and industrial sector.
Duarte founded Interferometric Optics in May 2006. At Interferometric Optics, Duarte interacts directly with a variety of commercial and industrial clients. His R&D emphases are on dispersive miniature tunable lasers, very large N-slit laser interferometers, multiple-prism optics, and secure space-to-space interferometric communications.
Following his doctorate at Macquarie University, in Sydney, Australia, he did postdoctoral research at the University of New South Wales. Afterwards, he traveled to the United States to assume a physics professorship at the University of Alabama (1983-1985). He was then invited to join the former Imaging Research Laboratories at the Eastman Kodak Company, in Rochester, NY, as a senior research physicist, where he remained until 2006. At Eastman Kodak, besides his R&D functions, he directed the Imaging and Spectral Measurements laboratory. He has also participated in extensive research collaborations, mainly on high-power tunable lasers and directed energy propagation, with scientists at the US Army Missile Command, and the US Army Space and Missile Defense Command, in Huntsville, Alabama.
Duarte introduced the generalized multiple-prism grating dispersion theory, applicable to laser linewidth narrowing and pulse compression, has discovered various multiple-prism grating laser oscillator cavities, and pioneered the application of Dirac's quantum notation to N-slit interferometry and classical optics. He is the author, and editor-author, of several well known books on tunable lasers. He is a fellow of the Australian Institute of Physics, a fellow of the Optical Society, and a recipient of the Paul F. Forman Engineering Excellence Award also from the Optical Society.
Source: Interferometric Optics
