George Pinho is not your everyday UW Physics alumni. George enjoyed his time at Waterloo so much that he spent well over a decade at UW and earned three degrees during that time (B.Sc 1992, M.Sc. 1995, PhD 1999). George is now a business leader with over 20 years of experience in technology innovation, product development, and product commercialization in both the image display and medical device markets. As president of Christie Medical, George leads a team focused on developing and commercializing near-infrared imaging technologies for medical applications. His achievements were recently recognized with the 2019 distinguished alumni award from the UW faculty of science.
While working on his graduate degrees, George had a reputation as someone who could “get things done”. His graduate supervisor Walt Duley described George as someone who “had all the attributes one wants in a graduate student….hard work, creativity, flexibility. Everything was carried out to the highest standard!” Walt also noted that “George was equally capable in the machine shop, working on making components for his experimental equipment, and in carrying out calculations on the properties of laser generated plasmas. He combined this with the diplomatic skills needed to work effectively with our collaborators at Stuttgart University on a project jointly sponsored by the German and Canadian governments. Everything went smoothly when George did the project management!”
When asked why he came to Waterloo, George recalled “I came to Waterloo for three reasons. One was that Waterloo Physics was known for having a great undergraduate program with excellent Professors. I felt this would give me the best opportunity to advance my understanding of Physics. Second, was the co-op program. I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with a physics degree and I thought the co-op program would give me additional options. As it turned out, I was in the co-op program for only 2 years. By third year, my heart was set on going to graduate school. In large part, this was due to the excellent Professors. Lastly, it was the self-contained campus. I had visited other schools and I felt the Waterloo campus had a much nicer atmosphere and campus organization that made it easy to get around.” It was during his undergraduate studies that George’s interest in lasers and optics was born. "I was always fascinated by lasers but didn't really know how they worked. After the course, I knew I wanted to work in the field of optics.” While noting that he felt all of his courses were well taught, George did remark that “Prof Wing-Ki Liu...taught some of the more difficult courses in Physics but he had a way of explaining the material that made difficult concepts easier to understand. “
Finally, as someone who has enjoyed so much success in applications of physics (with 9 patents, and many industry awards), his advice to physics students is remarkable:
Physics is a fundamental science. It is a challenging but rewarding program and a physics degree can enable a graduate to enter a variety fields. The key to success is to focus on deeply understanding the fundamentals in each physics course a student takes.
