Earlier this week, a massive 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck the countries of Syria and Turkey with devastating impact on their people. As a college of many international peoples, the Wyant College of Optical Sciences encourages support for the international recovery efforts underway. Please consider donations to any organization, with examples that you might consider including

Announced by the college last week, Bahram Jalali, PhD; a pioneer of silicon photonics and a prolific inventor of record-setting imaging and sensing technologies and algorithms, has established an endowed chair in his name at the University of Arizona James C. Wyant College of Optical Sciences. Bahram wishes for his endowed chair to support faculty whose innovations and discoveries will further the global impact of optical technologies. 

Congratulations are in order for Tianyao Zhang who took home third place in the SPIE Photonics West AR VR MR student optical design challenge competition. Yexin Pei and Gregory M. Nero also participated in the optical design challenge. Prof. Yuzuru Takashima advises the students and Prof. Yushi Kaneda co-advises the winner. Yuzuru said of the competition and his students' participation, "Tianyao, Greg, and Yexin participated the student optical design challenge competition at SPIE ARVRMR. All presented very well, and Tianyao got a prize!"

As the Superbowl approaches in Phoenix, AZ the Wyant College was invited to participate in a special VIP Media event hosted by UArizona.