ALPhANOV expands laser facilities

Talence, France - ALPhANOV, the optical and laser technological center of the "Route des Lasers" competitive cluster, has begun its installation in the Institute of Optics of Aquitaine (IOA), which recently opened its doors on the campus of the University of Bordeaux. Its new premises, which represent more than 2000 sq m, will be able to accommodate all of its teams, previously spread over two separate sites.

IOA brings together a branch of the Institut d'Optique Graduate School (IOGS), the LP2N laboratory (Laboratoire de Photonique, Numerique et Nano Sciences), the in-service training platform Pyla, the staff of the Route des Lasers cluster, and ALPhANOV. New facilities will enable ALPhANOV to accommodate industrial partners and to increase co-location of R&D.

ALPhANOV acts as a "technological amplifier," serving innovative projects in which research scientists, engineers and laboratory specialists, SMEs and corporate industrial groups, cooperate.

Its administration, the laser sources and components department, and the laser and optical systems department are already in place. The larger cleanroom and many experimental halls will allow them to conduct more ambitious work. The laser micromachining department will join the IOA in early 2014.

ALPhANOV will now be able to expand its work in the topics addressed by the research center LAPHIA (Lasers and Photonics in Aquitaine) and within the LP2N laboratory, which is also installed in the IOA. Meanwhile, the work launched in recent months will ramp up : large composites machining, tissue engineering by lasers, and deployment of an industrial pilot line.

The new facilities will also allow the company to further expand its support to the economic development of the Aquitaine photonics industry. In addition to the space occupied by its teams, the facilities can also accommodate partners to strengthen existing projects or encourage the development of new collaborations. In the coming months, several companies will have facilities close to ALPhANOV engineers and technicians: INSERM, Argolight, Cilas, Innoptics, LASEA, and Muquans. Meanwhile, the scope of the technological support to business development will be expanded through joint work with the entrepreneurship training of the IOGS, another tenant of the new institute.