Future Leaders Awards 2025 Announced
We are delighted to announce the two winners of the ORC Future Leaders Awards, Ziwei Zhai was the winner of the Team’ 96 prize as a 3rd year PhD student. The winner of the Professor Sir David Payne Student Scholar prize is 1st year PhD student Fedor Chernikov. A huge congratulations to both students on this amazing achievement.
There was a total of six applications and three of these were shortlisted with Ziwei and Fedor achieving first prize. Each student presented to a panel of judges from the senior team at the ORC to present and talk through their respective research area with details on the impact and outreach activities they have been involved with.
Professor Sir David Payne Scholar Award Winner – Ziwei Zhai was nominated by Professor Jayanta Sahu for demonstrating academic excellence, technical competence and great commitment to her research. Ziwei has contributed to advancing the field of erbium- and bismuth-doped fibre amplifiers with wideband and high-performance for telecommunication applications.
Professor Jayanta Sahu said: “Having witnessed her efforts and achievements, I believe that Ziwei is highly deserving of this award. I sincerely hope her talent and dedication are recognized through this prestigious honour.”
Ziwei said: Winning the Team ’96 Prize is an incredible honour and a significant recognition of my PhD journey. This award not only boosts my confidence but also inspires me to aim higher and make a lasting impact in the field. It serves as a reminder that perseverance and passion can lead to achievements beyond expectations, encouraging me to keep pushing forward in my future endeavours. I am truly grateful for this recognition and for the unwavering support of my supervisor—the best supervisor in my heart.
Team’ 96 Award Winner – Fedor Chernikov was nominated by Dr Ben Mills for demonstrating outstanding performance in his first year as a PhD student, excelling in both academic and outreach activities. His strong technical competence and innovative contributions to the new "AI and Photonics" lab (Building 60) have significantly advanced the HiPPo Programme Grant. Fedor played a key role in the first experimental demonstration of the HiPPo concept, where AI was used to coherently combine multiple beams.
Professor Michalis Zervas said: “We are delighted that Fedor, a first-year PhD student, has won The Professor Sir David Payne Student Scholar Award. He has made significant contributions to the new "AI and Photonics" lab and the HiPPo Programme Grant. His pioneering idea of integrating principal component analysis with machine learning for coherent beam combination has enabled a novel approach to phase-locking Yb-fibre amplifiers, which is likely to become a standard in the field.”
Professor Graham Reed (Director of the ORC) said: "It's always a great pleasure to present awards to our fantastic students, who are the future of photonics. Congratulations and well done to all those who were nominated and the winners.”