Speakers

Scroll down to read more about the speakers presenting at the conference. For further updates follow us on our socials #iopspring25.

Louis Barson

Director for Science, Innovation and Skills at the Institute of Physics. Prior to joining the Institute of Physics, Louis was a senior civil servant leading on technology policy in the industrial strategy, including key emerging technology sectors such as Artificial Intelligence, Quantum Technologies, Robotics and Digital Twins – and catalysing joined-up prioritisation work which led to the 5 Critical Technologies being established.

He is passionate about energy and the climate and has experience leading policy and strategy for the £9bn Homes Decarbonisation portfolio, as well as working on the EU Emissions Trading policy and developing the initial proposal for the Green Investment Bank. He also led early cross-departmental work to re-evaluate the business case for Space Based Solar Power (SBSP). Louis has a passion for the big questions and exploring diverse cultural perspectives. Before the civil service, he studied Japanese Philosophy in Tokyo and Kyoto Universities, and is fluent in Japanese. He established and led the DIT/BEIS Aerospace Hub – refocusing the £3.95 Aerospace R&D portfolio to better support international trade. He also developed and led the ‘Innovation is GREAT’ campaign, unlocking investment into the UK innovation system from large international investors and corporates – as well as working in the UK Space Agency and Intellectual Property Office. Louis recently completed a BSc in Physics with the Open University, and is working on his Mandarin.

David Fleming

David Fleming received a BSc and PhD from TU Dublin in 2002 and 2007 respectively and has managed the Time, Frequency and Acoustics Laboratories in the NSAI NML since 2014. As part of this work, David maintains the National Reference Measurement Standards in both Laboratories and was responsible for the establishment of UTC(NSAI). This local representation of Coordinated Universal Time contributes to the calculation of International Atomic Time and serves as the basis for the traceability for calibrations undertaken in the NSAI NML’s Time & Frequency Laboratory. With private partners, David has worked on the establishment of the National Timing Grid of Ireland (NTG - Ireland's first National Timing Grid launched) over the last number of years and expects to make UTC(NSAI) time available over NTP and PTP in the coming months. The NTG aims to improve the resilience of timing in critical infrastructure sectors on the island of Ireland and the distribution of UTC(NSAI) will enable better synchronisation of devices requiring high accuracy time stamping.

David is Ireland’s Contact Person for EURAMET’s Technical Committees on Time & Frequency, Acoustics and Quality.

Dr. Deirdre Kilbane

Dr. Deirdre Kilbane is the Director of Research in Walton Institute for Information and Communication Systems Science in the South East Technological University. Walton Institute focuses on investigating futuristic next-generation technologies, combining cutting edge ICT research and innovation to provide real world commercial applications for the benefit of society. Deirdre has a BSc in Experimental Physics from UCD and a PhD in Mathematical Physics from MU. Her research interests include nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, and quantum physics. She is a Principal Investigator in CONNECT: the Research Ireland Centre for Future Networks & Communications. She is leading the €10 M IrelandQCI project on behalf of CONNECT that is developing a national quantum communication infrastructure funded through the EuroQCI Initiative (DIGITAL Europe Programme and Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications).

Dr. Cian McKeown

Dr. Cian McKeown is a materials physicist working in the medical device industry.

Since winning the Rosse medal in 2017 and completing his PhD on nanostructured electrocatalysts for hydrogen fuel cells in 2018, Cian spent two years working in the University of Limerick in outreach and lecturing roles before making the transition to industry. Since 2020 Cian has worked as a materials scientist for medical device companies such as Aerogen (Galway), Boston Scientific (Clonmel), and Stryker (Limerick), applying the skills developed during his PhD to failure analysis, fractography, R&D, and process development of a range of technologies including nebulisers, implantable pacemakers, and prosthetics.

Dr. Mark Mitchison

Mark is an Assistant Professor in Quantum Science and Royal Society-SFI University Research Fellow at Trinity College Dublin. Born and raised in London, obtained his undergraduate degree from the University of Leeds in 2011 and his PhD from Imperial College London in 2016. He then worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Ulm (2016-2018) and then Trinity (2018-2021), before joining the faculty at Trinity in 2021. Mark’s research interests span mesoscopic and atomic physics, quantum optics, non-equilibrium statistical mechanics, and quantum information. He is especially interested in questions at the intersection of metrology – the science of measurement – and thermodynamics – the physics of energy and entropy. He currently leads the EU Quantum Flagship consortium ASPECTS, which aims to establish how measurements of time and other quantities are constrained by non-equilibrium fluctuations at the nanoscale.

Oliver Power

Oliver Power received B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in experimental physics from the University College Cork, Cork, Ireland, in 1978 and 1981, respectively, and the Ph.D. degree from the Dublin Institute of Technology, Dublin, Ireland, in 2006. He is a Technical Manager with the National Standards Authority of Ireland, where he is responsible for the development, maintenance, and dissemination of the Irish national measurement standards for electrical quantities. His research interests include the characterization of electronic voltage standards and the evaluation of measurement uncertainty.

Biographies Coming Soon:

Sarah Markham (Boston Scientific, IOP Ireland Committee Chair)
Sinéad Mannion (Queens University Belfast)
Venkatesh Kannan (Irish Centre for High End Computing)
Alix McCollam (University College Cork)