Older Norwegians' understanding of loneliness

This interpretive study explored older people's understanding of loneliness and what they considered appropriate and effective ways of dealing with it. Thirty elderly people were interviewed in-depth; 12 described themselves as “lonely” and 18 as “not lonely.” We found a striking difference in the way “lonely” and “not lonely” people talked about loneliness. The “not lonely” participants described loneliness as painful, caused by the person's negative way of behaving and a state they should pull themselves out of. The “lonely” participants also described loneliness as painful, and gave more detailed descriptions of loneliness as disconnection from others, from their former home and from today's society. The “lonely” participants were more reserved and subdued in trying to explain loneliness, attributing it partly to themselves, but mostly to the lack of social contact with important others. Some felt able to handle their loneliness, while others felt unable to cope. This study underlines the importance of subjective experiences in trying to understand a phenomenon like loneliness and of developing support for lonely older people unable to cope on their own

Optical links for detector instrumentation: on-detector multi-wavelength silicon photonic transmitters

We report on our recent progress in developing an optical transmission system based on wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) to enhance the read-out data rate of future particle detectors. The design and experimental results of the prototype of a monolithically integrated multi-wavelength transmitter are presented as well as temperature studies of electro-optic modulators. Furthermore, we show the successful permanent coupling of optical fibers to photonic chips, which is an essential step towards packaging of the opto-electronic components