by Jens Christoffersen, VELUX Group

For the second time, PhD students met on 14 May 2013 to focus on daylight, its effects on people and the environment. The students spend a day together, with allocated experts/mentors and with sufficient time for sharing new ideas and methods, to review and discus – and most importantly to meet fellow students – and to create a community among PhD students across Europe. Thanks to the students who attended, VELUX Academic Forum was, yet again, a great success!

When we organized the first VELUX Academic Forum in 2011, we hoped to encourage and promote high quality research in the field of daylight, and to establish a community for PhD students. Inspired by this, other conferences and forums have been established to ensure and strengthen the dialogue with the next generation of lighting researchers, which add to the ample reasons for optimism about lighting’s bright future in our buildings and communities, as an industry, and as part of the fabric of society (J. Veitch, Lighting Res. Technol. 2011, 43, 4).

Our wish is also  to gather information and links to Daylight thesis’ around the world, so pass the information and make this site “the hub” where students can find all relevant information and literature related to daylight.

Siobhan Rockcastle, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland

María Ámundadóttir, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland

Mandana Sarey Khanie, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland