Optical systems research

Across two UCD and Huawei Technologies research projects, I worked on beam steering, beam shaping, and optoelectronic switching. The work combined programming and optical modelling with the practical discipline of aligning real components and measuring what the system actually produced.

In 2018, I worked as lead programmer in a team developing and testing beam-steering algorithms with MATLAB, Python, and experimental hardware. In 2019, the research moved into optoelectronic switching and beam shaping, with extensive use of Python and Zemax OpticStudio.

Model the system

Zemax OpticStudio provided a way to describe the optical path and inspect how a design should behave before changing the physical setup. Python and MATLAB supported algorithm development, data handling, and repeatable analysis around those models.

Build the path

Physical optics makes small errors visible. Component position, angle, focus, and alignment all matter. The bench work translated an abstract model into a constrained real system with lenses, mounts, fibre, detectors, and test equipment.

I compared model output with physical measurements, then worked through any difference to see whether it came from the model, the setup, the algorithm, or the measurement.

• Writing down the model assumptions made them easier to check.
• Changing one variable at a time kept the tests easier to compare.
• Unexpected measurements often pointed to something useful in the setup.

This work taught me to turn a difficult system into smaller measurable questions, build a useful experiment, and use the result to decide what to change next.