Nanophotonics Research Lead | Skandan

Skandan is currently a nanophotonics research lead at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah, USA, in collaboration with Google. Keep reading to learn more about how he got there, what his work is like, and how to break into the photonics field!

How did you get to where you are today?

I was introduced to a photonics project back in 2020 at the Klinkova Lab at the University of Waterloo, where I was given the task to design a plasmonic nanopolymer. I used tools such as Lumerical FDTD and COMSOL to optimize the structure of the nanoparticle. In the end, I designed a nanoparticle that was highly responsive to certain polarizations of light, making it highly selective for biosensing. I was amazed by the work being done by others in the field, which was all entirely new to me. That’s when I caught the bug for photonics and decided to focus on a photonics career.

In March 2022, I started research work at a photonics group at Brigham Young University in Utah, USA. Here, I got exposed to the world of silicon photonics: the idea of building circuits that run on light and that are built with the same tools used to fabricate regular integrated circuits (ICs). I was tasked with developing an open-source simulation tool for photonic integrated circuits (PICs) called Simphony. All of this culminated in me developing an immense interest in PICs and open-source nanotechnology simulation software. I went in search of more similar tools and started contributing to some — including GDSFactory, a Google product for designing, simulating, and prepping PICs for fabrication.

Now, I lead a team of researchers in the group, in collaboration with and with funding from Google, to develop a Process Design Kit (PDK) for the Google-Skywater project, a collaboration between Google and Skywater Technology to build open-source tools to design ICs and PICs on the Skywater fabrication facilities. This way, researchers get easy access to tools for designing highly efficient, manufacturable PICs in a very short time.

What are the main responsibilities of your job? What project(s) have you taken on?

My main responsibility is to make sure my team puts out a PDK in collaboration with Google with highly optimized photonic devices by the end of March 2023. We will include several photonic devices like waveguide bends, couplers, splitters, waveguide crossings, and many other photonic devices to control light at the nanoscale. To optimize the photonic devices, we will use adjoint topology optimization, eigenmode expansion, finite-difference time domain, and shape optimization. This involves running multiple simulations on the photonic devices and letting the software design it for us, rather than doing it the old-fashioned way of doing it analytically.

Obviously, the results of the simulations cannot be trusted blindly–after all, a computer is not as smart as a human engineer! Hence, we will get these devices fabricated and tested to make sure they perform well.

After March 2023, I will be spearheading our team into a project where we will design the world’s first free, open-source, photonics bootcamp for undergraduate students. This bootcamp will teach undergraduates the basics of photonics and how to become efficient photonics designers. I hope to move this to the University of Waterloo one day and make it free for all nanotechnology engineering students to hopefully get more people to join this incredible field.

The great thing about working with both industry and academia is that I find myself in a golden spot for connections and networking. I have met nanotechnology engineers in companies like Google, Google X, Meta, and Apple. I have also met some of the smartest people in photonics from MIT, Princeton, and Georgia Tech. I have gained incredible exposure to what’s being done in photonics, and I get to learn where this field is headed and what the hottest research topics are.

What’s your favourite part about your job?

My favourite part about doing photonics research is that I get to learn something new every single day. The learning curve is steep and challenging, all of which make research the most fun career of all to me.

It is also more appealing to me than other jobs since I feel a sense of satisfaction and pride in my work that I don’t feel I would get anywhere else. The idea that there is a slight chance that my work can have a huge impact, at least many years down the line, makes me feel optimistic and makes me want to do my job rather than see it as a chore or task.

I also get to meet and work with some of the smartest researchers in the world who are steering photonics towards being a very popular and mainstream research field, making it one of the more employable fields of nanotechnology in the future.

What are you planning on pursuing after graduation? Do you need a postgraduate degree for your job?

After graduation, I plan on working in the industry for a while. Normally, one would need a PhD to work in this field full-time. However, the co-op program at the University of Waterloo has been a blessing, and I have already gained 2+ years of experience in photonics. Nanotechnology engineering students, thanks to the co-op program, are way far ahead in terms of experience and skills than their peers anywhere else, which makes them very employable.

After a few years of working in the industry, I may potentially pursue a PhD to aim for more senior research positions, which are typically reserved for doctorates.

Any tips for getting a similar position to yours or entering a similar field to yours?

The best way to get into research is to start from academia. Expectations for students when they are looking for research positions are much lower in academia than in industry. There’s also a greater chance to learn the fundamentals of research and the field in academia than in industry where you are working in a much more fast-paced environment to put out a product in a limited amount of time.

Starting out with research is as simple as finding a professor whose research interests you, reaching out to them with your resume, and asking for an opening in their research group. Most professors will not respond. This is normal; do not take it personally.

As you move towards upper years, my suggestion would be to look outside WaterlooWorks for better research positions. By this time, you should have an idea of what you would like to do and where the best work in your field happens. You should also have built a great network of mentors, fellow researchers, etc. Make full use of every connection you have to get the most out of your coops.

A great way to get into computational photonics is to take a look at open-source photonics tools on GitHub and try to contribute to them. Most packages have a “good first issue” tag on the Issues page on their GitHub repositories. This is a great way to learn how the underlying code of the tools work, while at the same time make minor contributions. Open-source project contributions are also great things to add to your resume.