Global Optics
Optics Research in the Russian Suburbs
Russia is known as a global leader in optics research. What’s surprising is the amount of cutting-edge research being conducted outside major city centers. Sergey Chekalin refl ects on the history of optics in Russia and describes his experience working on new optics technologies at Troitsk’s Institute of Spectroscopy
A monument in Troitsk honors junior researchers—the main workforce of science. “MHC” stands for junior researcher in Russian.
In the late 1960s, laser optics, especially the optics of ultra-short pulses (USPs), became very popular with researchers in Moscow, Saint Petersburg and large urban centers such as Nizhny Novgorod and Novosibirsk—but they really blossomed far from the central region and in areas outside the great cities. Powerhouses like Tomsk, Vladivostok and Troitsk have produced some of the most high-impact optics discoveries in the world.
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