ECE Assistant Professor [profile:gpopescu] has been designated a senior member of the Optical Society of America (OSA), the leading professional society for optics and photonics.
Written by Susan Kantor, ECE ILLINOIS
Gabriel Popescu
ECE Assistant Professor Gabriel Popescu has been designated a senior member of the Optical Society of America (OSA), the leading professional society for optics and photonics. This senior membership recognizes Popescu as a well-established researcher in optics.
“I am pleased with this recognition by the OSA, an organization with which I have been associated for quite some time,” Popescu said.
Senior members must be active OSA Individual Members who have at least 10 years of significant professional experience.
Popescu, a researcher in the Beckman Institute, is an expert in cell imaging. His research combines developing new imaging technology for basic biological studies as well as clinical applications. For example, Popescu recently led a research team to the invention of a new microscopy technique that gives scientists a better understanding of red blood cells. This technique reveals the mechanics of red blood cell membranes, which improves the treatment of blood diseases, such as malaria and sickle-cell disease.
”We are continuing to push our investigations of red blood cells to the clinic, in an effort to establish a faster and more sensitive type of blood testing,” Popescu said. “Other areas of our research include quantitative investigations of cell dynamics and label-free cancer detection. These studies are funded through an NSF Career award and an NIH exploratory grant.”
Popescu is a full-time faculty member in the Bioimaging Science and Technology group and is the director of the Quantitative Light Imaging (QLI) Laboratory at the Beckman Institute.