Faculty Directory

Biography

Yamuna Phal is an Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering at the Colorado School of Mines, where she leads the Next-Generation Optical Technologies Laboratory. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), her M.S. from the California Institute of Technology, and her B.Tech. from IIT Roorkee. Before her doctoral studies, she developed optical transceivers at Finisar Corporation and space instrumentation at the Swedish Institute of Space Physics.

Her research combines optical physics, instrument design, and computational methods to advance mid-infrared sensing and imaging. Her group develops quantum cascade laser–based instruments, structured illumination methods, and computational imaging architectures for biomedical analysis, pharmaceutical manufacturing, and space exploration. A major contribution of her doctoral research was the development of a mid-infrared microscopy platform that uses polarization control to probe molecular chirality. This work enabled vibrational circular dichroism (VCD) imaging, was featured in Optics & Photonics News, and led to a published U.S. patent application. Her research has also been featured on four journal covers.

Since establishing her independent laboratory in 2023, Phal has secured more than $2 million in external funding, including NSF Partnerships for Innovation and NASA PICASSO awards. These projects advance chiral drug–tissue imaging, biosignature sensing, and computational optical instrumentation. Her honors include the President of India Award, recognition through MIT EECS Rising Stars, a NASA Glenn Faculty Fellowship, and a NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory graduate fellowship. She also received the Harold Olsen Award and E. A. Reid Fellowship at UIUC for her contributions to undergraduate teaching and engineering education.

Education

• B.Tech Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (2011) 
• M.S. Electrical Engineering, California Institute of Technology (2014) 
• Ph.D. Electrical Engineering & Computer Engineering, University of Illinois (2023) 

Research

• Optical Instrumentation
• Biosensing
• Signal Processing
• Computational Imaging
• Biomedical applications
• Space applications

Publications

• M. Le, V. Arrunategui Norvick, L. Nafie, Y. Phal, "Quantum Cascade Laser-Based Vibrational Circular Dichroism Imaging for Chiral Biosensing," Invited Paper, Annual Reviews of Analytical Chemistry, 2026.
• A. Utiushev, I. Rasskazov, Y. Phal, "Transfer-Matrix Framework for Modeling Mid-Infrared Vibrational Circular Dichroism Spectra," Analytical Chemistry, 2026.
• M. Le, O. Myers, J. Squier, Y. Phal, "Mid-Infrared Quantum Cascade Laser-based Structured Illumination Microscope," Optics Letters, 2026.
• V. Arrunategui Norvick, M. Le, E. Modesitt, O. Myers, R. Akrami, Y. Phal, "Rapid Vibrational Circular Dichroism Spectroscopy via Synchronized Photoelastic Modulator-Quantum Cascade Laser Integration," ACS Measurement Science Au, 2025.

You can find all of Yamuna’s publications here

Additional Information

Research Website