Erich P. Ippen is a main researcher in the Research Laboratory of Electronics (RLE) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He has held the titles of Elihu Thomson Professor of Electrical Engineering Emeritus and Professor of Physics Emeritus. He is one of the leaders of RLE’s Optics and Quantum Electronics Group.

In 1985, Ippen was chosen as a member of the National Academy of Engineering for his early work in nonlinear optics in optical waveguides and techniques for creating very short optical pulses. In 1989, he was also named a Fellow of the American Physical Society for his early research on creating, measuring, and using picosecond and femtosecond light pulses in physical systems. Professor Ippen is also a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

In 1997, he received the Arthur L. Schawlow Prize in Laser Science. He served as president of the Optical Society of America in 2000. He has been awarded the R. W. Wood Award by the Optical Society of America (OSA) in 1981, the Charles Hard Townes Medal in 2004, and the Society’s highest honor, the Frederic Ives Medal/Jarus W. Quinn Prize, in 2006. Most recently, Ippen was named an Honorary Member of the Society in 2020.