light. In 2013, Cao realised a high-resolution microspectrometer on a disordered photonic chip. She fabricated a random array of air holes in a silicon wafer. Multiple-scattering events within the random structure allows for tiny, high resolution spectrometers that can be used for a variety of applications. Alongside the novel photonic devices, Cao made use of non-conventional lasers for high power, stable lasing systems. In collaboration with Ortwin Hess at Imperial College London and Qijie Wang at Nanyang Technological University, she utilized wave-chaotic cavities as well as disordered cavities to disrupt the formation of filaments. Filaments can lead to instabilities during laser operation, and Cao has shown that introducing wave chaos to a laser resonator can significantly improve the emission stability. In 2018 Cao was named the Yale University Beinecke Professor of Applied Physics, and in 2019 the John C. Malone Professor of Applied Physics and of Physics. She has been a member of the International Scientific Committee of ESPCI Paris since 2017, and a member of the advisory board of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Light. Awards and honours 2001 National Science Foundation CAREER Award 2000 Sloan Research Fellowship 2004 Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award 2006 American Physical Society Maria Goeppert-Mayer Award 2007 Elected Fellow of the American Physical Society 2007 Elected Fellow of The Optical Society of America 2013 John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship 2014 Microscopy Today Innovation Award 2015 Willis E. Lamb Award for Laser Science 2017 Elected Fellow of American Association for the Advancement of Science 2019 Elected Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers 2021 Elected to the National Academy of Sciences 2021 Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 2021 IEEE Photonics Society (IPS) Aron Kressel Award 2022 Rolf Landauer Medal, the International ETOPIM Association Select publications References Peking University alumni Princeton University School of Engineering and Applied Science alumni Stanford University alumni Northwestern University faculty Yale University faculty 21st-century American physicists Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science Fellows of Optica (society) Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Chinese emigrants to the United States 21st-century American women scientists Sloan Fellows American women physicists Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American women academics