John Donegan Professor

Prof. Donegan joined the School of Physics in Trinity College in 1993 where he is the Deputy Director of CRANN, the TCD Nanoscience Institute. He leads the Photonics effort within the School of Physics where his research interests are in Optical Communications, Nanophotonics and Integrated Photonics. Research in the area of optical communications is primarily focused in single mode and widely tunable lasers based on slotted surface gratings along with monolithic integration of amplifiers and modulators. He is leading a new effort on integrated sources for ultra-broad soliton combs from SiN and AlN microresoantors with applications in high-precision clocks and frequency synthesizers. Other Nanophotonics Research covers a range of topics including examination of photonic devices for Heat-Assisted Magnetic Recording and single photon emission and degradation dynamics of nanoscale Au plasmonic devices.

Professor Donegan has extensive experience working with industry at AMBER most notability with Western Digital and Nokia Bell Labs and PilotPhotonics within Ireland. His work with AMBER is centred on the development of optical systems to deliver light to nanoscale structures where thermal and optical effects allow for novel optical storage as well as enhanced single photon emission.

Following his PhD Prof. Donegan held post-doctoral fellowships at Lehigh University in the US and at the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Physics in Germany. He returned to Ireland in 1990 taking a post-doctoral position with John Hegarty within the Optronics Ireland research centre.