The 53rd Annual Laser Damage Symposium also known as Symposium on Optical Materials for High Power Lasers will be held 17-20 October 2021 in the Hilton Garden Inn / University and Medical Center in Rochester, New York, USA. This meeting continues to be the leading forum for the exchange of information on the physics and technology of materials for high-power and high-energy lasers. The series of conference proceedings has grown over the history of the conference to be a comprehensive source of information on optics for lasers and includes topics on laser-induced damage mechanisms, materials and thin film preparation, durability, properties modeling, testing, and component fabrication. This symposium will start with a kick-off event – Sunday Evening Tutorial, Plenary Session, a featured Mini-Symposium, and Thin-Film Laser-Damage Competition. As usual, it will include both poster and oral presentations with no parallel sessions.

Since 2012, selected papers presented at this Symposium are published in special sections of Optical Engineering – one of the major journals published by SPIE.

Submissions are due Fall 2021 and can be done via SPIE manuscript submission portal.

Distinguished international researchers in the field of optics for high-power/high-energy lasers will present plenary and invited talks. Submissions are solicited for the four core technical sections, Plenary Session, and the Mini Symposium. 

We welcome your participation in this meeting by submitting your abstract(s) and encouraging your colleagues to do the same.

Conference Chairs

	Christopher Wren Carr Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (United States)
	Vitaly E. Gruzdev Univ. of New Mexico (USA)
	Detlev Ristau Laser Zentrum Hannover e.V. (Germany)
	Carmen S. Menoni Colorado State Univ.(United States)
	MJ Soileau, Emeritus Chair Univ. of Central Florida (United States)

International Program Committee

Detlev Ristau (Committee Chair), Laser Zentrum Hannover e.V.(Germany)
Jonathan W. Arenberg, Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems
Enam A. Chowdhury, The Ohio State Univ.
Eyal Feigenbaum, Lawrence Livermore National Lab.

Ella Field, Sandia National Lab.

Lars O. Jensen, Laser Zentrum Hannover e.V.

Takahisa Jitsuno, Osaka Univ.

Laurent Lamaignère, CEA-Cesta
Klaus Mann, Laser-Lab. Göttingen e.V.
Andrius Melninkaitis, Vilnius Univ.
Jean-Yves Natoli, Institut Fresnel
Raluca A. Negres, Lawrence Livermore National Lab.
Semyon Papernov, Lab. for Laser Energetics
Jonathan Phillips, STFC Rutherford Appleton Lab.
Wolfgang Rudolph, The Univ. of New Mexico
Christopher J. Stolz, Lawrence Livermore National Lab.
Meiping Zhu, Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Science

Local Organizing Committee

Stavros G. Demos, Lab. for Laser Energetics
Jean Steve, Univ. of Rochester

Founding Organizers
Arthur Guenther
Alexander Glass

Organizer
SPIE

Conference Sponsors
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Univ. of Rochester
Spica Technologies
UltraFast Innovations
Optimax Systems, Inc.

Cooperating Organizations
CREOL & FPCE, College of Optics and Photonics, Univ. of Central Florida
Colorado State Univ.
Laser Zentrum Hannover e.V.
The Univ. of New Mexico