The first part of this talk will be a partly historical overview of fundamental features of lasers and laser radiation, including coherence, optical resonators, and nonlinear properties of lasers and laser-matter interactions. Attention will then be focused on how these and other basic concepts of laser physics are being applied to realize unprecedented energies, powers, pulse durations, and coherence of light.

Peter W. Milonni (Ph.D, Physics, University of Rochester, 1974) is a Research Professor of Physics at the University of Rochester. He was previously a Research Physicist at the Air Force Weapons Laboratory (1974-77), a Senior Staff Engineer at the Perkin-Elmer Corporation (1977-80), a Professor of Physics at the University of Arkansas (1980-1985), and a Staff Member (1986-94) and Laboratory Fellow (1994-) at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. His research interests are primarily in the areas of quantum optics, electrodynamics, and laser physics, especially in connection with the quantum and fluctuation properties of electromagnetic radiation and its interaction with matter. He is currently on the editorial boards of Progress in Optics, Contemporary Physics, and Advances in Optics & Photonics, and is a Divisional Associate Editor for Physical Review Letters. He received the 2008 Max Born Award from the Optical Society of America.

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