Prasad Named Fellow In Optical Society of America

Release Date: October 21, 1994 This content is archived.

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BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Paras N. Prasad, Ph.D., Photonics Science Professor of Chemistry at the University at Buffalo, has been named a fellow in the Optical Society of America.

Prasad was honored earlier this month at the society's annual meeting in Dallas for his outstanding contributions to the development of organic materials for nonlinear optics. The society confers the status of fellow on no more than one-tenth of its total membership.

An internationally recognized leader in the field of optics and spectroscopy, Prasad joined the UB faculty in 1974. He serves as founder and director of the UB Photonics Research Laboratory, a multidisciplinary program considered one of the most advanced and comprehensive facilities for photonics in the world.

Photonics -- dubbed the technology of the 21st century -- is the information-processing counterpart of electronics that uses photons, rather than electrons, to process information. Its greatest potential lies in the eventual development of computers that can store, process and transmit information at the speed of light, about two orders of magnitude faster than computers in use today.

The UB lab has earned a unique position among the world's photonics laboratories. While other research facilities tend to focus either on the fundamental science behind the design of photonic materials or on their industrial applications, the UB program was designed to do both.

Prasad co-authored, with David J. William, Ph.D., "Introduction to Nonlinear Optical Effect in Organic Molecules and Polymers," the only monograph-textbook in the field. He has written or co-written more than 250 articles for publication in scholarly journals.

Prasad actively has promoted the development of scientific infrastructures in Third-World countries by organizing international symposia. He chaired an international conference in Jakarta, Indonesia, in January, 1993.

A native of India, Prasad attended Bihar University, where he won several scholastic awards. He received his doctoral degree in chemistry from the University of Pennsylvania.

He resides in Williamsville.

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