The University of Padua is one of Europe’s oldest (founded 1222) and most prestigious seats of learning; it is a multi-disciplinary university that aims to provide its students with both professional training and a solid cultural background. It is one among the largest Italian Universities, with about 60.000 students and a permanent staff of about 4.500 (more than 2000 professors) distributed in 34 Departments. According to the results of the National Evaluation Agency (ANVUR), the University of Padua excels in the quality of research, particularly in Industrial and Information engineering, Physics, Medicine, Economics, Psychology and Agriculture. Every year, it is ranked among the first World 100-200 Universities by several international ranking bodies (QS World University Rankings, Center for World University Rankings – CWUR etc.).

Research on fiber optics at the University of Padova began in the early 80s. One of the first research groups in Italy dedicated to this field, the group was initially funded by the Ministry of Communications (ISPT), the National Research Council (CNR), and Telettra spa. Close cooperation was also established soon with Fondazione Ugo Bordoni, Roma. The field of interest grew to involve several aspects of photonics and opto-electronic engineering. Since then, the group has participated in several research projects, either national or International (among which it is worth to mention the UE projects: Esther, Atlas, Gospel, Domino), which involved Government institutions (ISCTI, CNIT), private companies, Universities and Research Centers. The group, now named Photonics and Electromagnetics Group (peg.dei.unipd.it), has carried out research in several topics like fiber characterization techniques (in particular based on back-scattering measurements), polarization mode dispersion, nonlinear optics and, more recently, fiber sensors and multimode/multicore fibers.

Members of UniPD research unit