The Faculty of Photonics and Optical Information Technology is intended to train bachelors and masters on same educational direction "Photonics and Optical Information Technology". The initiative of this creation, which took place in 2004 in Russia, belongs to academic and faculty research team of Faculty.
Photonics is an area of science and technology, related to the use of light radiation (or photon stream) in the optical elements, devices, and systems, in which optical signals are generated, amplified, modulated, distributed and detected.
Optical Informatics is a recently identified and dominant in current years area of photonics, in which optical technologies of transmitting, receiving, processing, storing and displaying information are created.
As a part of the educational direction "Photonics and Optical Information Technology" the Faculty trains specialists for one of the most innovative areas of modern science and technology.
In this area optical technologies of high-speed transmission of information and its hyperdense recording are developed, optical and quantum processors are created. Moreover, artificial intelligence systems and other information and telecommunication systems of the new generation are created on the basis of nanotechnologies and new optical materials, and also informational and computer technologies. Photonics and Optical Informatics is a vigorously developing high-tech industry with the annual income of trillions of rubles from sales of devices and systems all over the world.
Bachelors and Masters receive in-depth knowledge and practical skills in both traditional collective disciplines of higher education, as well as in the field of the optical physics, the theory of information and information systems, architecture of the computing systems, optical materials science, systems and technologies of photonics, optical and quantum information technologies, programming technologies, as well as in innovative management in the field of high technologies.
The Faculty has several dozen of educational and research laboratories and centers. Active cooperation with the firms and companies is used to prepare professionals demanded in the labor market. In accordance with the curriculum areas of "Photonics and Optical Information Technology", which involve a system of pass-through research works and scientific and technological practices, since the second year students of the faculty have the opportunity to participate in the work of successful companies, as well as in scientific research and technological projects at the University ITMO, and other research and innovation centers of St. Petersburg, conducted in the field of Photonics and Optical Information Technology under state orders of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation, Russian and international grants and contracts.
An important component in the preparation of high-quality young professionals and scientists is the organization and conduction by the Faculty in accordance with other educational and scientific organizations and societies, of international youth schools and conferences, creation and development of youth scientific associations, as well as Russian and international scientific societies Facultys.
Among the students, faculty and graduate students are the ones who got the scholarship of the President of the Russian Federation and the Government of the Russian Federation, the winners of the best scientific works competitions, conducted by the Russian Academy of Sciences, Ministry of Education and Science, the world's largest scientific societies and foundations, such as INTAS (The International Association for the Promotion of Cooperation with Scientists from the Independent States of the Former Soviet Union) SPIE (International Society for optics and photonics), CRDF (U.S. Civilian Research and Development Foundation), OSA (Optical Society of America) and others.