SPIE Student Member Yunfeng Nie has been awarded the 2016 Michael Kidger Memorial Scholarship. The award will be presented to her during the UK Optical Design Meeting at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in Oxfordshire on 15 September.
Nie is a PhD student at Vrije Universiteit Brussel under the guidance of SPIE Fellow Professor Hugo Thienpont and Professor Fabian Duerr, who won the Kidger award in 2012.
Nie is conducting research on a new design algorithm for specialty freeform imaging systems. Her research is funded by the Marie Curie Initial Training Network ADOPSYS (Advanced Optical SYStem design) of the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme.
Nie majored in precision machinery and precision instrumentation at the University of Science and Technology of China. She received her master's degree in optical engineering from the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, where she won awards including the Highest Director Award for her work in the design and realization of a novel Féry prism imaging spectrometer.
The Michael Kidger Memorial Scholarship was established in 1998 to honor Michael John Kidger, a well-respected educator, design software developer and member of the optical science and engineering community. This scholarship is awarded to a student engaged in optical design of either imaging or non-imaging systems.
