People

Professor Kishan Dholakia (FRSE, OSA Fellow, SPIE Fellow) is a professor in the Department of Physics & Astronomy and as Director of the Centre of Light for Life, Adelaide. His research interests cover pretty much everything related to optics.

Graham Bruce is the senior researcher and laboratory manager in the group. He joined the Optical Manipulation group as a research fellow in 2016, and now leads work on a variety of topics including optical trapping, speckle metrology and Raman spectroscopy through barriers. His work has been recognised by major awards including STEM for Britain and the Museums and Heritage Awards.

Stella Corsetti joined the Optical Manipulation Group as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in February 2018. Her research includes the use of advanced optical and imaging techniques for biomedical applications and medical diagnostics. She obtained her BSc in Biomedical Engineering and her MSc in Bio-Nanotechnology Engineering from the University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’,  and her PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of Aberdeen. Her project involved the use of single particle manipulation techniques and Raman and Infrared spectroscopy to study hydrocarbon phase transitions. She then became a PDRA exploring the applications of Raman spectroscopy and surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) in drug discovery and medical diagnostics.

George Okyere Dwapanyin

Research Fellow

George Okyere Dwapanyin joined the group as a research fellow in January 2021 with research focusing on advanced optical imaging techniques. He has a PhD from Stellenbosch University, South Africa where his dissertation focused on the development of a multimodal imaging system for Biophotonics applications. His previous education includes a BSc in Physics from the University of Cape Coast, Ghana, MSc in Optics and Photonics from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany, and MSc in Photonics Engineering, Nanophotonics and Biophotonics from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Spain after having being part of the pioneering batch of the Erasmus Mundus Europhotonics master program.

Morgan Facchin

Research Fellow

[email protected]
+44 (0) 1334 461840
ORCID: 0000-0003-3143-068X

After his Master’s in Astrophysics at the University of Toulouse, Morgan joined the group in 2019 as a PhD student to work on speckle metrology. Since his graduation in 2022, he’s been hanging around as a postdoc working on beam shaping techniques and arsenic detection. He has a few secret side projects such as a quantum choice generator, modeling of the Foucault pendulum, and other quirky things. 

Edward Appleton joined the research group in September 2024 as a PhD student, focusing on optical chemical profiling through scattering media. They earned their Bachelor’s degree in physics from the University of St Andrews, where their final year project involved measuring the transmission matrix of a disordered medium.

Hal Gee

PhD Student

[email protected]
+44 (0)1334 461820

Hal began his PhD with the group in September 2024, following a master’s degree in physics at the University of Glasgow, where for his final project he worked on real-time phase-shift profilometry for potential medical use. He is now focused on the applications and refinement of speckle metrology. His personal interests include most forms of linguistics, low-level programming, and hobby electronics.

Ané Kritzinger

PhD Student (joint with Centre of Light for Life, Adelaide)

[email protected]
+44 (0) 1334 461656

Ané Kritzinger joined the group in July 2023 as a joint PhD student with the Centre of Light for Life at the University of Adelaide in Australia. She obtained a Master of Science from the University of Pretoria in South Africa.  Her MSc research project laid the groundwork for a novel analytical technique by combining holographic optical tweezers and fluorescence spectroscopy of quantum dots, bridging the fields of environmental chemistry and photonics.  For her PhD research she will explore applications of Raman spectroscopy. 

Manuel Martínez Ruiz

PhD Student

[email protected]
+44 (0) 1334 461656
ORCID: 0000-0001-9333-2239

Manuel graduated from INAOE in Mexico. His Masters project consisted on new applications of non-diffracting beams for optical trapping by implementing the optical tweezers toolbox and the use of beam shaping techniques at The University of Queensland, Australia. His joined the Optical Manipulation Group to pursue his PhD Project in micromanipulation in liquid, air and vacuum. 

Peter Andersen

Department of Health Technology,
Technical University of Denmark

Shanti Bhattacharya

Department of Electrical Engineering,
IIT Madras

Kylie Dunning

Adelaide Medical School,
University of Adelaide

Malte Gather

Humboldt Centre for Nano- and Biophotonics,
University of Cologne

M Pilar Gil

Libraries and Museums
University of St Andrews

Ian Goodall

Scotch Whisky Research Institute

Frank Gunn-Moore

School of Biology,
University of St Andrews

Thomas Krauss

Department of Physics,
University of York

Takashige Omatsu

Molecular Chirality Research Centre,
Chiba University

Michael Prystowsky

Department of Pathology,
Albert Einstein College of Medicine

James Pullman

Department of Pathology,
Albert Einstein College of Medicine