Professor Graham Reed

Graham Reed, FREng, FIET, FSPIE, FOSA, FEOS, CEng, is Professor of Silicon Photonics and Deputy Director of the Optoelectronics Research Centre (ORC) at the University of Southampton, UK.  He graduated in Electronic and Electrical Engineering with first class honours in 1983, and with a PhD in Integrated Photonics in 1987. In April 2012, he and his group joined Southampton from the University of Surrey, where he was Professor of Optoelectronics, and was Head of the Department of Electronic Engineering from 2006 to 2012.

Reed is a pioneer in the field of Silicon Photonics, and acknowledged as the individual who initiated the research field in the UK.  He established the Silicon Photonics Research Group at the University of Surrey in 1989. The Group is now approximately 50 people, and have provided a series of world leading results since its inception, and are particularly well known for their work on silicon optical modulators. For example, the Group produced the first published design of an optical modulator with a bandwidth exceeding 1 GHz, proposed the pre-emphasis method of driving silicon modulators, and were the first to publish the design of a depletion mode optical modulator, which is now a technology standard device. In 2011 the team were responsible for the first all-silicon optical modulator operating at 40Gb/s with a high extinction ratio (10dB), as well as a second modulator design (also operating at 40Gb/s) that operates close to polarization independence.  They also reported the first device operating at 50Gb/s. Recently they have been pioneering Mid Infra-Red Silicon Photonics, mid-index photonics platforms, programmable photonics, and computing applications of silicon photonics.

He has been a consultant to numerous companies in the field of Silicon Photonics, including Intel (USA), Bookham Technology (UK), Kotura (USA), Rockley Photonics (UK/USA), Optic2Connect (Singapore), and CompoundTek (Singapore).

Reed is a regular invited and contributing author to the major Silicon Photonics conferences around the world.  He has served on numerous international conference committees, and has also chaired many others. He is currently a member of 6 international conference committees, including being co-chair of the entire “OPTO” group of 35 conferences at SPIE Photonics West.  He has published over 550 papers in the field of Silicon Photonics, including almost 150 invited/keynote/plenary talks. In 2013 he was the recipient of the IET Crompton Medal for Achievement in Energy, for his work on Silicon Photonics, and in 2014 he was awarded a Royal Society Wolfson Merit Award.  In 2017 he was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, in 2019 he was awarded an industry prize (PIC award) for his contribution to the Silicon Photonics field, and in 2020 he was elected as a Fellow of the Optical Society of America (OSA), and the European Optical Society (EOS).  He was a Board member of the European Optical Society (EOS)  2014 - 2018, and is currently a member of the Board of the MIT Microphotonics Centre, and a visiting Professor at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore.

He currently leads the £6.2M “Silicon Photonics for Future Systems” programme, a UK research programme funded by the EPSRC, as well as the £1.5M CORNERSTONE 2 project (also EPSRC funded), a £1.5M EPSRC Platform grant, a £4.9M EPSRC Prosperity Partnership project, and is part of the leadership team  of the National Hub in High Value Photonics Manufacturing (£10M).  In addition he leads several smaller industry and government contracts from the UK, Europe and internationally.