Tobias J. Kippenberg

Tobias J. Kippenberg is Full Professor in the Institute of Physics and Electrical Engineering at EPFL in Switzerland since 2013 and joined EPFL in 2008 as Tenure Track Assistant Professor. Prior to EPFL, he was Independent Max Planck Junior Research group leader at the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics in Garching, Germany. While at the MPQ he demonstrated radiation pressure cooling of optical micro-resonators, and developed techniques with which mechanical oscillators can be cooled, measured and manipulated in the quantum regime that are now part of the research field of Cavity Quantum Optomechanics. Moreover, his group discovered the generation of optical frequency combs using high Q micro-resonators, a principle known now as micro-combs or Kerr combs. For his early contributions in these two research fields, he has been recipient of the EFTF Award for Young Scientists (2011), The Helmholtz Prize in Metrology (2009), the EPS Fresnel Prize (2009), ICO Award (2013), Swiss Latsis Prize (2014), as well as the Wilhelmy Klung Research Prize in Physics (2015), the 2018 ZEISS Research Award, the 2020 R.W. Wood Award and the 2025 Marcel Benoist Swiss Science Prize. Moreover, he is 1st prize recipient of the "8th European Union Contest for Young Scientists" in 1996 and is listed in the Highly Cited Researchers List of 1% most cited Physicists in 2014-2024. He is founder of the startup LIGENTEC SA, an integrated photonics foundry.