Colorado is a state of top-level science, stunning nature, and delicious craft beer. My colleague Ville Kolehmainen and I share a love for all three of those. So, when the Finnish embassy in Washington D.C. invited the FAME Flagship to join their delegation to CO, we suited up and flew right in.
Day 1. Fort Collins, November 12, 2025
Our first visit on Wednesday was to Innosphere, an organization helping science-based startup companies succeed in Colorado. Especially interesting was the introduction to the ASCEND Engine, a network very similar to our Finnish FAME Flagship. Both aim to connect academic researchers and companies so that they can develop new technology together. Of course, we started planning joint activities.
After a lunch in the historic centre of Ft. Collins, it was time to enter Colorado State University (CSU) campus. That’s a place I know very well, since this was perhaps my 20th visit there. I have worked together with Professor Jennifer Mueller since 1997, and since she moved to CSU in 2000, I have visited her on research collaboration almost every year. I have usually been in a mathematical bubble while staying at CSU, but this time I got a wider viewpoint on research at CSU: our delegation was treated with presentations by professors of physics and various fields of engineering. It was a good chance to learn about topological quantum objects like skyrmions, data center cooling solutions, and revolutionary new battery technology.
The Finnish delegation at Innosphere in Fort Collins, Colorado. Ambassador Leena-Kaisa Mikkola in the front.
The delegation next gathered in Jen’s Electrical Impedance Tomography (EIT) laboratory. EIT is an emerging medical imaging method where harmless electric currents are fed into the body through electrodes. The resulting coltages are measured, and the goal is to calculate an image of the internal distribution of electrical conductivity. It is relatively easy for electricity to pass through blood, while air is quite resistive. Therefore, the EIT image can be used for watching heart and lungs in action.
I am enormously proud of being a part of the success of Jen’s lab. Together with her, we have developed a mathematical method for EIT image formation. The method is based on inverse quantum scattering studies from 1960’s, later transported by pure mathematicians to the world of inverse problems. Furthermore, Jen and I took these deep theoretical results and turned them into practical computer programs. And now we can see those efforts as Kyler’s heart and lung activity on a monitor in real time. Clinical use of EIT is progressing nicely. Jennifer uses her device in Children’s hospital of Colorado for studying the lungs of babies and toddlers suffering from cystic fibrosis. There is no other way than EIT to see how much air is actually reaching these tiny patients’ lungs.
Jen and her research group had prepared an amazing show: PhD student Kyler was hooked up to the EIT machine, and we could see his lungs fill up with air and empty again during his breathing cycles. Furthermore, he held his breath for a while, and the real-time EIT device showed us how blood was moving from the heart to the lungs and back. This was a demonstration you can only see in two or three places on the planet.
The next destination for our delegation was Advanced Beam Laboratory, sporting an amazing laser setup. It delivers a short pulse of light at an incredible power of 1 PW. That is one petawatt, meaning 1 000 000 000 000 000 watts of power. Amazingly, the average power is only 30 watts, comparable to a regular light bulb. How is that possible? The pulse of light is very short, only 1 fs in duration. One femtosecond is 0,000 000 001 seconds. So while the power of the pulse is high, it is only on for a brief amount of time.
What do they use such a laser for? Professor Reed Hollinger told us about several different applications, but one of them struck a special chord with me. The intense energy delivered by the light pulse creates super-strong X-rays when they hit a metal target. Those rays can be used for “flash radiography”, freezing the fastest motion and producing X-ray images of otherwise unseen phenomena. But more importantly from my point of view, it is possible to rotate a sample and record X-ray images along many directions of projection. This in turn enables tomography, or slice imaging, one of my favorite research topics. The high energy of X-rays allows tomography of very dense objects, such as machine parts made of heavy metals like tungsten. It might be possible that the recent results from my group (CITE) could help Prof. Hollinger to produce tomographic images quicker and with less noise. I hope that’s the case and starts a new collaboration.
In the evening our group rode to Boulder, where Finnish-American Community FACC had kindly organized an awesome reception. We could even enjoy a local version of lonkero, the classic Finnish refreshment more officially known as Long Drink.
Day 2. Boulder, November 13, 2025
Thursday kicked off with a SPIE Quantum Catalyst Event. I am not much involved with the startup company scene, and that’s why I found the panel discussion involving venture capitalists (VC) quite interesting. For example, Kirsten Suddath (Next Frontier Capital, Boulder) made a curious point about the size of a VC company. If an entrepreneur promises a three-fold return for a 3 million dollar investment in three years, she is not interested. Namely, that kind of money “doesn’t even move the needle” in her VC company since it is so large. She is after larger profits.
A note for the record: if anyone out there wants to give me 6 million dollars, I will take it.
Our delegation got a chance to shine in the second item of the SPIE program. Ambassador Leena-Kaisa Mikkola opened the Building a Quantum Ecosystem panel discussion with encouraging words about Finland-Colorado collaboration. The panel itself had also a Finnish member: Professor Juha Purmonen from University of Eastern Finland, representing FAME Flagship’s sibling, the PREIN Flagship that focuses on photonics.
In the afternoon, we had a round table discussion at CU Boulder about quantum research and startup companies. It was a delightful mix of people: Finns from Finland, Finns living in the US, Americans who work in Finland and Americans who have spent significant time in Finland. As expected, we found many connection points in our activities in photonics, quantum physics, and inverse problems.
One of the highlights of the whole trip was the “Fab Lab” of JILA. They have all kinds of power tools for manufacturing metal parts. Some of them were computer controlled, some old-school lathes and other machines. This way experimental researchers can produce prototypes quickly for their measurement devices and improve them in a fast cycle.
Sarah Dickson’s laser lab was so impressive. As far as I understood, they are studying quantized vibrations in macroscopic membranes excited by laser pulses. All of that happens inside a Finnish “refridgerator” from Bluefors company, in temperatures close to absolute zero.
The day was capped by an “Innovation after hours” event organized by Innosphere. Offered was a panel discussion between startup companies, and more importantly, craft beer.
Day 3. Idaho Springs, Colorado, November 13, 2025
Friday was all about learning new stuff. First of all, it turned out that Idaho Springs is not located in Idaho but actually in Colorado. Furthermore, in Idaho Springs there is a mine belonging to Colorado School of Mines but not involving mining. Obviously, we needed to get to the bottom of this, and Professor Wouter van de Pontseele was kind enough to take us for a tour.
We stepped into the mine conveniently along a horizontal tunnel. Less convenient was the fact that the roof was at about 1,8 meters, and taller delegates needed to walk while maintaining an awkward but humble posture.
However, after a while we reached the main part of the mine, with a higher ceiling. FAME agents Ville and Samu had a chance to study the railroad system of the mine.
The main research advantage of the experimental mine is the 200 meters of rock above. That is enough to stop most of the cosmic rays, mainly muons, that disturb sensitive measurements. CU Boulder physicists expect to find new results about the ghost particles called neutrinos.
Senior Specialist Petri Koikkalainen from the Finnish Embassy in Washington D.C. and Samuli Siltanen wearing proper headgear for a mine tour.
As mentioned above, Friday was all about learning new stuff. The delegates enjoyed an underground lesson in the experimental mine, not disturbed by the annoyingly bright Colorado sun.
As a final note, I mention that I arrived one day early. That allowed me to talk with Jen about the state of our (almost complete) new book, and to play a couple of rounds of Pelastaja (Firefighter) boardgame developed in my research team at University of Helsinki.
About the author: Professor Samuli Siltanen is the FAME Flagship’s Vice Director. At the University of Helsinki, he works as Professor of Industrial Mathematics at the Department of Mathematics and Statistics as well as serves as Vice Dean at the Faculty of Science. Being passionate about popularization of science, Professor Siltanen publishes science videos on two YouTube channels: Professor Sam and Samun tiedekanava. You can read more about his research and science activities at his Research homepage.
Photos: Samuli Siltanen | Top photo: Vice Director Samuli Siltanen and Professor Ville Kolehmainen in JILA laser laboratory at CU Boulder, Colorado.
