I. Basic Overview

The Key Laboratory of Optical Fiber Sensing and Communications, Ministry of Education, is affiliated with the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China. Its predecessor was the State Key Laboratory of Broadband Optical Fiber Transmission and Communication Network Technology, which was designated as a key laboratory of the Ministry of Education in 2002. Over the past two decades, the laboratory's capabilities havebeensignificantly strengthened, and its research focuses have been expanded from optical fiber transmission and communication networks to the fields of optical fiber sensing and communications. In 2009, with the approval of the Ministry of Education, the laboratory was officially renamed the "Key Laboratory of Optical Fiber Sensing and Communications, Ministry of Education." The laboratory director is Professor Yunjiang Rao, an IEEE/OSA/SPIE Fellow and one of the first recipients of the Yangtze River Scholar Professorship and the National Outstanding Youth Fund. The chairman of the academic committee is Professor Desheng Jiang, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and a professor at Wuhan University of Technology, while the vice chairman is Professor Shenghua Ye, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and a professor at Tianjin University.

The laboratory addresses major national needs and international academic frontiers, establishing an advanced interdisciplinary research platform based on fiber optics that integrates optics, sensing, communications, and instrumentation. It has built a scientific research system centered on fiber optic sensing, fiber optic communication, and communication networks, dedicated to overcoming technical bottlenecks in key sectors such as energy, defense, and communications in China. The lab has become a vital research and talent cultivation base in the field of fiber optic sensing and communications in China, wielding significant international influence in fiber optic sensing. It acts as a core to support the A+ discipline of Information and Communication Engineering at the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China.

II. Talent Team Status

The laboratory has a fixed staff of 40, including 1 academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, 4 fellows of international first-level societies, and nearly 20 national- and provincial-level talents. It has been approved as an innovation team by the Ministry of Education and a 111 international cooperation base. More than 20 members serve as editors-in-chief or editorial board members of internationally renowned journals. The laboratory has received 8 outstanding doctoral and nomination awards from national first-level societies and has trained over 2,000 postgraduate students.

III. Research Directions

Fiber optic sensing:

Led by Professor Yunjiang Rao, IEEE/OSA/SPIE Fellow, the team has reached internationally leading level in the field of optical fiber sensing. They have won five provincial and ministerial-level first prizes for scientific and technological achievements and published a number of representative papers in top-tier journals such as Nature, Nature Photonics, Science Advances, and Nature Communications. Their works have been recognized twice as a significant annual advancement by the Optical Society of America (OSA). Professor Rao founded the SCI-indexed journalPhotonic Sensors(selected as the zone one (Q1) journal by the Chinese Academy of Sciences) and initiated the Asia-Pacific Optical Sensors (APOS) international conference. The uDAS fiber-optic distributed seismograph developed by his team has become a key equipment for China's oil and gas exploration and development, earning a spot in CNPC's Top 10 Annual Technological Advances. Through the transfer and commercialization of uDAS technology, they established the first joint venture of the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China with the central state-owned enterprise—BGP Borehole Division.

Fiber optic communications:

Led by Professor Kun Qiu, selected for the "the New Century National Hundred, Thousand and Ten Thousand Talent Project", the optical communications team is the only research group in China with complete optical communications technology chain. Addressing major national strategic needs, they have made significant contributions in areas such as novel optical devices, high-speed optical transmission, all-optical signal processing, ubiquitous optical access, and specialized optical communications. The team has undertaken over 20 national-level projects with funding exceeding 80 million yuan, published more than 300 high-level research papers, authored 6 monographs, and obtained over 100 authorized patents. They have also trained over 300 doctoral and master's students. Through deep collaborations with several internationally renowned universities and institutions such as China Electronics Technology Group Corporation, China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, and Huawei, they successfully incubated the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China's first listed company—Chengdu UESTC Optical Communication Co., Ltd. Additionally, they led the winning of one National Technology Invention Second Prize.

Communication networks:

Led by Professor Lemin Li, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, the team has won seven provincial and ministerial-level science and technology awards in recent years. They have undertaken over 10 major/key projects under the National Natural Science Foundation of China, national key R&D programs, and major special programs of the Ministry of Science and Technology. Achievements have been made in areas such as intelligent service management and control of communication networks, cloud-edge-terminal collaborative computing, network simulation, ubiquitous IoT access, vehicle-mounted intelligent networking, low-power intelligent sensing and RF chips, and multi-dimensional array sensor signal processing.

IV、Representative Achievements

Representative Achievement I:

R&D of Fiber-Optic Distributed Seismograph Instrument uDAS

By leading the Major Instrument Project of National Natural Science Foundation, fiber-optic distributed seismic instrument uDAS was invented with several technological breakthroughs and international leading performances. A world record was set for ultra-deep well fiber-optic VSP testing at 7,500 meters (2018), marking a leapfrog advancement in China's borehole geophysical technology. This breakthrough overcame the bottleneck of "chokepoint technologies" in borehole fiber optics and enhanced the core capabilities of China's seismic exploration equipment and technology. Through commercialization, the uDAS instrument has been widely applied in China's oil and gas exploration and development, generating nearly 1 billion yuan in direct economic benefits. The achievement was selected as one of CNPC's Top 10 Technological Advances and won the First Prize for Technological Invention from the Chinese Society for Optical Engineering (2022) and the First Prize for Technological Progress from the Chinese Geophysical Society (2022).

Representative Achievement II:

R&D of Optical Frequency Comb Devices

Addressing the challenge of regulating optical frequency comb devices, we proposed and realized the first dynamically tunable dispersion optical frequency comb, with the findings published in Nature (2018), hailed as the "most flexible optical clock." We also proposed and achieved various optical frequency comb devices that cover multiple bandwidths for practical applications. Pioneering internationally, we integrated microcavity optical frequency combs with fiber sensing, enhancing sensing sensitivity by an order of magnitude. Over 10 related papers have been published in top journals such as Nature/Science sub-journals, eLight, and LSA, leading to the development of three types of prototypes that have received national metrology certification. These advancements serve the Xingguang III laser fusion system (China Academy of Engineering Physics) and have earned one Natural Science First Prize (2025) and two Outstanding Achievement Awards from the Chinese Optical Engineering Society.

Representative Achievement III:

R&D of Optical Communication Devices and Technologies

Supported by the NFSC and the National Key R&D Program, addressing the diverse demands for laser light sources in future multi-modal optical communication systems featuring ultra-high speed, ultra-low power consumption and ultra-strong security, the group has developed the theoretical foundation and technical system of optoelectronic integrated on-chip laser arrays, and clarified the influence mechanisms of thermal, optical, electrical, nonlinear and other physical effects in micro-nano optical structures on the performance of laser arrays; established the theoretical system for broadband random chaotic laser generation and physical-layer noise encryption; and provided crucial theoretical support for optical communication to boost artificial intelligence computing power, upgrade F5G all-optical networks, et al. Representative papers have been published in prominent journals including Nature Communications and Light: Science & Applications, with the original theoretical achievements exerting significant international influence and the relevant principles adopted by over 30 top institutions such as the NIST, NPL, Peking University and Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. The related achievements won the Second Class National Technological Invention Award in 2015 and the Excellent Achievement Award in Silicon-Based Optoelectronics of the Chinese Optical Engineering Society in 2025.