Congratulations to final year PGR Joaquín Faneca, who has just submitted his thesis: “Tunable Silicon integrated
photonics based on functional materials”.
Here is Joaquín’s experience of his time with the CDT:
When I started the PhD coming from another country, everything was difficult, you do not have your own language, your family, your friends, your culture, etc. You start from zero and even more, you are doing a PhD. The CDT in Metamaterials was helping us a lot, they were always willing to help us and support us if we need something since the beginning, they were like our family here to be honest. The cohort idea is good because at the end of the day you have different students to share different feelings and I think that is important.
Regarding research it was hard, the first year and half you realise how much you need to work just to get to the level that experts are, you start realising that everything takes a lot of effort and time. After one year a half I think is when you start to have the background in order to progress and start building your own ideas. From that point everything is a lot of work but enthusiastic because you feel that you are progressing. I will say that research is not easy but if you are passionate about it is the best! What an adventure! 4 years in another country, travelling around the world, to Russia, San Francisco, San Diego, there is people that will never visit this place and we were lucky that CDT was paying for our conferences and living costs in these cities. You are in contact with experts in your field, learning from everyone, not only research, but also, leadership, presentation skills, etc. I think this four years have been really intense but now CDT in metamaterials has made us really good professionals.
My future is in reconfigurable integrated circuits using different functional materials, I will keep working with the University of Exeter and the University of Southampton, but from Barcelona, we have different projects going on and I am quite enthusiastic about them.
Joaquin’s publications include:
April 2020– Joaquin Faneca, Liam Trimby, Ioannis Zeimpekis, Matthew Delaney, Daniel W. Hewak, Frederic Y. Gardes, C. David Wright, and Anna Baldycheva- On-chip sub-wavelength Bragg grating design based on novel low loss phase-change materials, Optics Express
March 2020- J Faneca, TD Bucio, FY Gardes, A Baldycheva- O-band N-rich silicon nitride MZI based on GST, Applied Physics Letters
February 2020- Joaquin Faneca, Thalia Dominguez Bucio, Frederic Y. Gardes, Anna Baldycheva- ‘Reconfigurable photonic integrated circuits (RPICs) based on functional materials for integrated optical communication applications’, SPIE Photonic West
February 2020- Emanuele Gemo, Santiago García-Cuevas Carrillo, Joaquin Faneca, Carlota de Galarreta, Wright CD- ‘Sub-wavelength plasmonic-enhanced phase-change memory’, SPIE Photonic West
November 2019- J Faneca, BT Hogan, IR Diez, FY Gardes, A Baldycheva- ‘Tuning silicon-rich nitride microring resonances with graphene capacitors for high-performance computing applications’, Optics Express
September 2019- TD Bucio, C Lacava, M Clementi, J Faneca, et al.- ‘Silicon Nitride Photonics for the Near-Infrared’, EEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics 26 (2), 1-13
May 2018- Joaquin Faneca, Tatiana S. Perova, Vladimir Tolmachev and Anna Baldycheva- ‘One-Dimensional Multi-Channel Photonic Crystal Resonators Based on Silicon-On-Insulator With High Quality Factor’, Frontiers in Physics and Frontiers in Materials
February 2018- Joaquin Faneca, Benjamin T. Hogan, E. Torres Alonso, Monica Craciun, Anna Baldycheva- ‘2D materials integrated in Si3N4 photonics platform’, SPIE Photonic West
Joaquin presented at the following conferences:
- Joaquin Faneca Ruedas, Geoff Nash, Anna Baldycheva; Poster: “Photonic metamaterials for WDM optical communications applications”, ITMO Doctoral Summer School, St. Petersburg, Russia, 14th May 2017
- Joaquin Faneca, Tatiana Perova, Vladimir Tolmachev, Geoffrey Richard Nash and Anna Baldycheva; Poster: “Liquid Crystal WDM Filter in Si Photonic Crystal Technology”, Progress In Electromagnetics Research Symposium, St. Petersburg, Russia, 24th May 2017
- Joaquin Faneca, Tatiana Perova, Vladimir Tolmachev, Geoffrey Richard Nash and Anna Baldycheva; Presentation: “Multichannel Si Photonic Crystal filters with Fine-Tuning capability of individual channels for WDM optical interconnects”, World of Photonics Congress, Munich, Germany, 26th June 2017
- Joaquin Faneca, Ben Hogan, Geoffrey Richard Nash and Anna Baldycheva; Poster: “Novel fluid materials for CMOS photonic WDM systems”, World of Photonics Congress, Munich, Germany, 26th June 2017
- Joaquin Faneca, Elias Alonso, Monica Cracium and Anna Baldycheva; Poster: “2D materials using silicon micro-ring resonators for CMOS photonic WDM systems”, The Annual Reliability and Maintainability Symposium, Exeter, UK, 11th September 2017
- Joaquin Faneca, Elias Alonso, Monica Cracium and Anna Baldycheva; Poster: “2D materials and liquid crystals integrated in silicon nitride platform for WDM optical interconnects applications”, Photonex, Coventry, UK, 11th October 2017
- Joaquin Faneca, Elias Alonso, Monica Cracium and Anna Baldycheva; Presentation: “2D material-enabled reconfigurable Si photonics for optical interconnects”, SPIE, San Francisco, US, 29th January 2018
- Joaquin Faneca, Geoffrey Richard Nash and Anna Baldycheva; Poster: “Add-drop filters based on microring structrues with fine-tuning capability for WDM optical interconnects “, SPIE, San Francisco, US, 29th January 2018
- Joaquin Faneca Ruedas , Geoff Nash, Anna Baldycheva; Poster: “Novel materials and nanofabrication of WDM for optical communications interconnect applications”, GW4 Workshop, Bath, UK, 13th July 2017
- Joaquin Faneca Ruedas , Geoff Nash, Anna Baldycheva; Poster: “Graphene modulators for WDM applications”, RMS Photonics and optoelectronics materials, Exeter, UK, 4th April 2018
- Joaquin Faneca; Poster: “Student Chapter Activities”, SPIE OPTICS + PHOTONICS, San Diego, US, 17th August 2018
- Joaquin Faneca, David Wright, Frederic Gardes and Anna Baldycheva; Poster: “Reconfigurable materials for integrated optical communications applications”, Photonex – Silicon Photonics, Coventry, UK, 10th October 2018