2015 will be celebrated as the "International Year of Light and Light-based Technologies". The official launch will take place in January with a major official event in Paris, the headquarters of "UNESCO", which will be attended by many famous physicists and Nobel laureates.
The International Year aims to highlight, on a global level, how light and light-based technologies impact every aspect of human life. 85 countries will participate in the relevant events that will follow in 2015.
Since 1959, the UN has established the institution of "International Years" and in this context, a series of celebrations with scientific-technological themes have preceded it, such as the International Years of Physics (2005), Astronomy (2009), Chemistry (2011) and Crystallography (2014).
The idea for establishing an International Year of Light (and related technologies) was conceived in 2009 by the European Physical Society and the relevant decision was taken in 2013 by the UN General Assembly.
2015 was chosen because it marks the anniversary of a number of important events, such as the 1,000th anniversary of the publication of a major medieval work on optics by the Muslim Ibn al-Haytham (or Alhazen), the 200th anniversary of the publication of Fresnel's landmark work on the wave nature of light, the 150th anniversary of Maxwell's seminal work on electromagnetism, which paved the way for modern technologies from lasers and photonics to mobile phones, and the 100th anniversary of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, which incorporated the speed of light as an essential parameter for describing space-time.
The International Year of Light will include a series of hundreds of events around the world, bringing together various scientists (from astronomers and physicists to doctors and biologists), engineers and artists, with the central goal of highlighting the importance of light and optical technologies for society.
Source: newsit.gr
