Jansens elected Fellows of SPIE

Vanderbilt biomedical engineering professors Duco Jansen and Anita Mahadevan-Jansen are among this year’s 62 new Fellows of the International Photonic Science and Engineering Society (SPIE).

Anita and Duco Jansen

SPIE Fellows are honored for their technical achievements and for their service to the optics and photonics community and to SPIE in particular. More than 800 SPIE members have become Fellows since the Society’s inception in 1955. This is only the second time in the Society’s history that a husband and wife were both honored as Fellows simultaneously.

Mahadevan-Jansen is recognized for specific achievements in the development of optical techniques for in vivo medical diagnostics and therapeutic guidance systems. Duco Jansen is recognized for specific achievements in biomedical engineering, laser interaction at optical neural interfaces.

In biomedical engineering, the husband and wife team of Anita Mahadevan-Jansen and E. Duco Jansen, professors of biomedical engineering, are among a small number of pioneers in biophotonics, finding ways to use light in medical breakthroughs diagnostically, surgically and therapeutically.

The Jansens lead Vanderbilt’s Biomedical Engineering Optics Lab. Mahadevan-Jansen directs the optical diagnostics research. Duco Jansen directs the majority of optical therapeutics and imaging research. In April his term begins as president of the American Society for Laser Medicine and Surgery. He is only the third non-M.D. in the 30-year history of the society to be elected president.

SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics, was founded to advance light-based technologies. Serving more than 188,000 constituents from 138 countries, SPIE annually organizes and sponsors approximately 25 major technical forums, exhibitions, and education programs in North America and EMEA, and supports scholarships, grants, and other education programs around the world.