ProfessorBenjamin Eggleton

FAA, FTSE, FOSA, FIEEE, FSPIE, FAIP, FRSN

Benjamin Eggleton is Pro Vice-Chancellor (Research) at the University of Sydney, where he leads the University’s research operations division with responsibility for driving research income, operational excellence and regulatory compliance. His remit spans research strategy, funding and pipeline development, research performance, and key post-award functions including contract management, clinical trials, research integrity and ethics, foreign interference and national security. Through this role, he works closely with senior leadership to strengthen institutional capability, performance, impact and reputation.

Eggleton is Professor in the School of Physics, leading an experimental photonics group. As Chief Investigator, he has secured over $60M in competitive research funding. He is a founding Co-Director of the NSW Smart Sensing Network (NSSN), leads the Jericho Smart Sensing Laboratory (JSSL) sponsored by the Royal Australian Air Force, and is a Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence in Optical Microcombs for Breakthrough Science (COMBS).

From 2018 to 2022, Eggleton served as Director of the University of Sydney Nano Institute. He previously founded and directed the ARC Centre of Excellence for Ultrahigh Bandwidth Devices for Optical Systems (CUDOS) from 2003 to 2017, and the Institute of Photonics and Optical Science (IPOS) from 2009 to 2018. He is a recipient of multiple Australian Research Council Fellowships, including Laureate Fellow and two Federation Fellowships and numerous awards, including the Malcolm McIntosh, Pawsey Medal, Walter Boas Medal, Adolph Lomb Medal and ICO Prize.

Eggleton received his PhD in Physics from the University of Sydney before joining Bell Laboratories, Lucent Technologies, in 1996 as a postdoctoral researcher. He later became Technical Manager of the Fiber Gratings Group, and subsequently Research Director for the Specialty Photonics Business Division and Director of Photonic Devices Research.

He has published over 540 journal articles, including in Nature Photonics, Nature Communications and Optica and has over 30,000 citations (h-index 90, WoS) and 50,000 citations (h-index 121, google scholar)

Eggleton is a Fellow of Optica, IEEE Photonics, SPIE, the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE), and the Australian Academy of Science (AAS). He has served the international optics community: as President of Australian Optical Society (2008–2010), IEEE Photonics Board of Governors (2015–2017), General Chair of CLEO (2019), Editor-in-Chief of Optics Communications (2007–2015), and Editor-in-Chief of APL Photonics (2015–2025).