Lab. OPTICS AND SPECTROSCOPY

Laboratory of Optics & Spectroscopy

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND

The scientific investigations on spectroscopy in the Institute of Physics of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (BAS) started in 1951. Then, the young researcher Paraskeva Simova began her scientific career after receiving her PhD degree in the Institute of Physics of the University of Leningrad. In 1952, the first scientific structural unit of spectroscopy – the Section of Spectroscopy - was established within the Institute of Physics – BAS. The first head of that section was Paraskeva Simova, then professor, doctor of physics. In the beginning, the spectroscopy section and its equipment were situated in the attic of the central academy building. The equipment however was relatively good for that time. At first it consisted of: a spectrograph for the ultraviolet spectral range - ISP-22, a spectrograph for the visible range ISP-51, a spectral projector, a microscope for measurements, and a photometer. The Laboratory of Optics and Spectroscopy was established simultaneously with the Institute of Physics-BAS.

Acad. G. Nadjakov, the first director of the Institute of Physics, founded the Section of Spectroscopy to provide other scientific domains as well as the industrial laboratories with spectral investigations. The spectroscopy section made relations with a number of scientific and industrial units (chemical, geological, medical) and many physicists and chemists from these units were trained in spectroscopy techniques in the Section. The first staff of the Section of Spectroscopy were Assoc. Prof. Dr. P. Simova and Assist. Prof. S. Simeonov. Due to the useful collaboration of the Section of Spectroscopy and the Department of Physics of the University of Sofia, Prof. P. Simova taught a course of lectures on spectral analysis. As a result, Assist. Prof. C. Bonchev, J. Pacheva and N. Vasileva from the Department of Physics were the first physicists to use the experience and the equipment of the spectroscopy section in order to develop new methods for emission spectral analysis. In the Section, many students from the Department of Physics were taught as well; the first ones were I. Savatinova, now Prof. Dr., and B. Scorchev. An essential assistance was provided to the chemists from the Department of Chemistry of the University of Sofia, as the methods of the molecular spectroscopy were applied for synthesis of new chemical substances, as well as for chemical composition determination of the petrol extracted from the Dolni Dabnik oil field.

In 1959 the Institute of Physics-BAS was moved to a new building (where it is still situated) and the spectroscopy section had a better environment for further research activity. A fundamental research field was the intermolecular interaction of substances in different states. During the fifties, high-pressure mercury lamps were used in the Raman techniques. In the Section of Spectroscopy, however, the first low-pressure mercury lamps (for the diffraction spectrometer DFC-12) were developed, with a good quality, thus ensuring a contemporary (for that time) investigation. The introduction of the laser, as a new spectral source in Raman spectroscopy, was carried out in the Section of Spectroscopy, immediately after the worldwide introduction of lasers in spectral techniques. The first successful experiments on nonlinear optics, concerning two-photon excited luminescence in crystals, stimulated Raman scattering, self-focusing and self-induction of the stimulated Raman scattering, were also accomplished by the researchers in the Section of Spectroscopy at that time.

A second research field, developed within the Section in the beginning of 1957, was Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR). The NMR equipment was developed by A. Derzhanski, now correspondent-member of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Prof. D.Sc. In the late sixties the NMR group initiated investigations of the modern at that time materials – the liquid crystals. As a result, this group evolved in a Laboratory of Liquid Crystals, with first head Prof. A. Derzhanski. At present, the Liquid Crystals Laboratory is well-known in the world liquid crystal community for the significant results obtained in investigation of the flexoelectricity.

In 1962, also within the Section of Spectroscopy, a research group of Atomic Spectroscopy led by Prof. Dr. J. Pacheva, was established. At present, this group is a Laboratory of Atomic Spectroscopy.

After the establishment of the Institute of Solid State Physics (ISSP) as a scientific unit within the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences in 1972, the Section of Spectroscopy was reorganized in a Sector of Optics and Spectroscopy. Later, further intensive development of the molecular spectroscopy of the condensed matter (infrared-IR, FT-IR, FT-far IR and Raman), thin-layer optics (head: Assoc. Prof. Dr. G. Zartov), integrated optics (head: Prof. Dr. I. Savatinova) and fiber optics (head: Assoc. Prof. A. Andreev) took place in the following more than twenty years.

In 1992, the Sector of Optics and Spectroscopy was reorganized in a Laboratory of Optics and Spectroscopy. As a result of the efficient work of the researchers of that Laaboratory, it achieved significant success, which is known in the scientific community of optics and spectroscopy of the condensed matter.

Heads of the laboratory since its founding:

P%20Simova kirov petrov-k1
Prof. DSc. P. Simova Prof. DSc. N. Kirov Prof. DSc. M. Petrov