Umit Demirbas was born in Egirdir (Turkey) in 1979. He received his BS degrees in physics (2004) and electrical engineering (2004), and his MS degree in materials science (2006) from Koc University. In July 2006, he entered electrical engineering department of MIT, where he is currently working towards his PhD degree.

    During his undergraduate and MS years, Mr. Demirbas was with the Koc University Laser Research Laboratory, where he mainly worked on development of broadly-tunable Cr:ZnSe lasers. Currently, he is a member of the Optics and Quantum Electronics Group at the Research Laboratory of Electronics of MIT. He is continuing his studies under the supervision of Prof. James Fujimoto and Prof. Franz X. Kärtner, in strong collaboration with Prof. Alphan Sennaroglu. His current research interests include solid-state laser development, ultrafast pulse generation and multiphoton microscopy. In particular, he is trying to develop low-cost broadly-tunable femtosecond lasers based on Cr:Colquiriite (Cr:LiCAF, Cr:LiSAF and Cr:LiSGAF) gain media.

    Mr. Demirbas is an author and coauthor of more than 15 journal papers. He serves as reviewer for Optics Letters and Optics Express journals. He is a student member of Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Photonics Society, Optical Society of America (OSA), The International Society for Optical Engineering (SPIE), and Optical Committee of Turkey (OCT). He is a IEEE Photonics Society Graduate Student Fellow (2009) and one of the finalists of OSA New Focus/Bookham Student Award (2008).

Contact Information

    50 Vassar Street, Room 36-337, Cambridge, MA 02139, Tel: 617-253-8520, Fax: 617-253-9611, umit[at]mit.edu