Quantum optics

Interview with Marlan Scully, Distinguished University Professor and Burgess Chair at Texas A&M and Distinguished Research Academician at Baylor University. The interview begins with Scully recounting his early experience contracting COVID-19 and how that informed his research into the virus. Then he describes growing up in Wyoming and recalls not being very interested in school until he fell in love with calculus while attending community college. Scully talks about his studies in physics at the University of Wyoming before eventually transferring to Rensselaer Polytechnic. He then discusses his decision to move to Yale to work with Willis Lamb on laser physics. Scully recounts his assistant professorship at MIT and the opportunity at University of Arizona, where he was involved with starting their Optical Sciences Center. He talks about his subsequent joint position between University of New Mexico and Max Planck Institute for Quantum Optics, as well as his work with Air Force weapons labs on laser applications. Scully details the events leading to his position at Texas A&M and the inception of the Institute for Quantum Studies, and his ongoing affiliations with Princeton. At the end of the interview, Scully reflects on the interplay between theory and experimentation throughout his career and in laser physics specifically, as well as the technological advances that have propelled laser research forward.

In this interview Nicolas Gisin discusses topics such as: his family and educational background; University of Geneva; Constantin Piron; Gerard Emch; University of Rochester; optics and quanum optics; Abner Shimony; Alphatronix; Guisan at the University of Geneva Group of Applied Physics (GAP); John Bell; Alain Aspect; Jean-Claude Zambrini; quantum cryptography; optical fibers.

Topics include: Yanhua Shih's early interest in physics and in Joseph Weber's experiments on gravitational waves; the Cultural Revolution in China delays Shih's studies; Shih's college studies in China and graduate work at the University of Maryland. His use of spontaneous parametric down conversion; the influence of contacts with Soviet physicsits. Shih takes a job at Baltimore County branch of the University of Maryland. Sheh and Morton Rubin elaborate their biphoton concept; their experiments to elucidate the concept; funding sources.

Some of the topics discussed include:  the development of his career along with the problems of the simultaneous development of his wife Ursula Lamb's career in academia; radiation; megnetron oscillators; laser theory; quantum theory of lasers; government funding of research.  Some of his associates mentioned are:  Arnold Nordsieck, George Uhlenbeck, Van der Pol, Charles Townes, Leonel Menegozzi, William Wing, Marlan Scully, E. T. James, William Bennett, Richard Fork, Sargent, among others.

Some of the topics discussed include:  the development of his career along with the problems of the simultaneous development of his wife Ursula Lamb's career in academia; radiation; megnetron oscillators; laser theory; quantum theory of lasers; government funding of research.  Some of his associates mentioned are:  Arnold Nordsieck, George Uhlenbeck, Van der Pol, Charles Townes, Leonel Menegozzi, William Wing, Marlan Scully, E. T. James, William Bennett, Richard Fork, Sargent, among others.